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Sir James Chadwick SwedishTV Nobel interview | Nobel Diploma front exterior |
Nobel Diploma front interior | Nobel Diploma interior
Nobel Diploma rear interior | Nobel Diploma translation
Nobel Diploma rear exterior | Nobel book | Chadwick photo |
The D.N. Pritt Fighter vs. Fascism Archive Pritt- honoraries|
Pritt-
Lenin Prize etc.
| Pritt- Reichstag | Pritt- others
Balfour - credentials from Victoria | Exchequer letters patent of Gladstone, 1873
The (Swedish General) Viktor Balck Olympic Games-Founding Archive
Swedish medals honoring Viktor Balck | Viktor Balck 1912 Olympics book
Tower and Sword collar of Viktor Balck
Statesmen | Koerber - 1920s friend, then foe of Hitler | Koerber-group | Historical commentary
Heroines | Vaganova - ballet guru |
First ever (gold NYC) Women's Club Medal of Honor
An award is a object given, usually in public, to a specific person (thus not being transferable to someone else) to represent or commemorate an achievement or career, and which is intended to thereby increase public respect, for the recipient (and only this recipient), and public passion and loyalty, for the institution presenting the award
An award is world-class insofar as its issuance either
(1)
is limited to recipients whose stature approach world-class status,
or who are thereby transformed into world class figures
or
(2)
is, at the time of issuance or later, of interest to high-level officials of states other than those directly involved.
A person is a world-class figure insofar as the person is widely known and respected within the global community, if not generally, then within a specific field of human endeavor. Anyone described in a biographical entry in
Encyclopedia Britannica
surely qualifies; anyone who is the subject of a biographical book, particularly years after the person's retirement or death, or those who appear in a country's Dictionary of National Biography
,
possibly qualify.
Diplomatic credentials (incl. Great Seal of Queen Victoria, in .. box .. of .. issue) presented by the Queen to Arthur BALFOUR , empowering him to negotiate on behalf of the U.K. govt. in Aug. 1898. He managed to conclude a secret agreement with Germany regarding the eventual fate of the declining Portuguese Empire. These talks were part of an effort
to explore the feasibility of an Anglo-German alliance, which was eventually wrecked by German blunders; Germany's failure to seize this golden opportunity is wistfully regarded by German scholars as Das Grosse Nein, the Great No which, had it been a Yes, might have turned German history away from WWI, Hitler, and the Holocaust. Balfour was later Prime Minister from 1902 to 1906, and in 1917 as Foreign Minister issued the famous Balfour Declaration granting the Jews a national home in Palestine. (Each year Balfour Day is celebrated by the friends of Israel and mourned by Palestine's Arabs.) He is considered the father of English golf. Incl. are full length bigraphies of Balfour, and books about pre-WWI Anglo-German relations.
What are Awards of Outstanding International Importance ?
A Nobel Prize is clearly a world-class award in a (mythic or legendary) class of its own, and so belongs in its own section on this web site; other awards are divided into those to statesmen and those to heroines
1913 silver "Victoria Cross" pinned onto the flag draping the coffin of suffragette martyr Emily DAVISON, who was crushed when she threw herself in front of a horse during the Derby, to protest the govt's failure to give women the vote, and died days later. This incident is one of the most famous of any kind to have been filmed before WWI, and is clearly the most famous single deed on behalf of women's rights anywhere . Her funeral procession through London drew crowds exceeded only by those for state funerals of deceased monarchs. Incl. are full length biographies.
Order of Pahlevi of Shah's Iran, Grand Cordon set of badge and star (gold, gilt, and enamel) in 18" x 14" presentation case, awarded to King LEOPOLD III of Belgium; only 35 ever awarded, only to heads of state and Crown Princes
Diploma (signed by Tsar Nicolas II) for the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky, one of the most prestigious awards of the Russian Empire, awarded to German Gen. Colmar VON DER GOLTZ, who would become the only man ever to be made a Field Marshal , with real authority, (as opposed to honorary rank) in two major armies. Germany's most prescient pre-WWI military theoratician, he would be made a Field Marshal in the Ottoman army and would train, among others, Mustafa Kemal (later known as Ataturk). Incl. are books by von der Goltz.
Stalin Prize 1st Class gold medal and impressive diploma, given in 1946 to Agrippina VAGANOVA , who is regarded as one of the greatest ballet theoreticians and teachers ever. Her pre-WWII book on ballet technique is continually reprinted and is available at most large US bookstores. (Group also
includes full length biographies of her, in English and Russian.) The regimen of the Vaganova Academy in St. Petersburg is emulated in Vaganova Schools around the world. Her international reputation was such that she survived the Stalin purges although (or because?) she never joined the Communist Party .
Agrippina
Vaganova
Academy
Order of Pahlevi
WSPU silver Victoria Cross
Great Seal
of Queen Victoria
A. VAGANOVA
Massive group of: Lenin Peace Prize medal, four honorary law degree or Honorary Citizen diplomas from E. European universities and cities, and other awards given to
Denis Nowell PRITT, K.C
. (King's Counselor)
.
Pritt, the William Kunstler of his day, had an international legal career that stretched from the 1920's to the 1960's. This Englishman's greatest claim to fame was his service as
chairman of the international
Commission of Enquiry into the Reichstag Fire
of 1933
.
The Nazis blamed the fire on Communists, and used this purported Communist conspiracy to justify their suspension of liberties guaranteed in the Constitution of the Weimar Republic; the Pritt Commission found that the Communists could not have started the fire, and that the Nazis probably were the culprits. The Pritt Commission Report (group includes a copy with a forward by Pritt, 1934) was smuggled into Germany in time to thwart the Nazi's effort to frame a group of Communists on charges of having set the fire; the Communists' acquittal in the trial in Leipzig was the last major victory for justice in Germany until Hitler's death. This Commission's report was the first major expose' of Nazi tactics to have a major impact upon public opinion toward the Nazi threat in Western countries.
Apart from this one role, Pritt had the general reputation as an ace lawyer, whose services were provided, often pro bono, to victims of political prosecutions, as when he
defended the likes of Kenyatta, Nyerere, and Ho Chi Minh, from prosecution by colonial authorities
.
The eventual Vietminh leader had faced extradition to French Indochina, where he surely would have been executed.
Pritt's services were in the highest demand from business interests, but he would never take a case against "the little guy." Pritt wrote dozens of books, (many incl. in this group, along with numerous books about the Reichstag Fire and an autographed copy of Pritt's Report, in German) capped by a 3-volume set of memoirs.
Swedish medals, incl. the only gold and bronze versions in existence , presented to (and honoring) the 80th birthday of the key co-founder of the Olympic Games, Viktor BALCK , who was a pillar upon whom International Olympic Committee boss de Coubertin "increasingly relied.... Ahead of his time, Balck was conscious of likely trends," whereas otherwise, de Coubertin's IOC was "absurdly unbusiness-like." Later the 1912 Stockholm Games, (run by Balck, to rave reviews) saved the Olympic Movement from likely collapse: the '04 and '08 Games had been so controversial that the interruption caused by the Great War (cancelling the 1916 Games) would likely have been permanent, had the Stockholm Games not been such a smashing success. Incl. is the official 1912 Stockholm Games Official Report, a 9 1/2 pound book presented to Balck; its inset silken endpapers are embossed with Balck's VGB monogram. Also incl. is his Collar to the Order of the Tower and Sword from the Portuguese Kingdom.
D.N. PRITT, wearing King's Counselor's whig; and with Kenya's Jomo Kenyatta.
Letters Patent
(with Victoria's Great Seal) presented to the Right Honorable
Prime Minister
Willam GLADSTONE
, appointing him U.K Chancellor of the Exchequer, 1873.
Considered one of Britain's greatest P.M.s, (he led four Ministries, intermittently during the period stretching from 1868 to 1894) his in
tense rivalry with the Conservative Party Leader Benjamin Disraeli
culminated in his famous Midlothian Campaign election victory, in 1880, which is often cited as the first modern political campaign.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer (equivalent to Minister of Finance, or Secretary of the Treasury, in other nations) is considered one of the four Great Offices of State, and in recent times has come to be the most powerful office in British politics after the Prime Minister.
Incl. is a study of Gladstone's performance as Chancellor of the Exchequer, written by
Sydney Buxton in 1901.
New York City Federation of Women's Clubs, (first of only eight awarded ) solid gold (& enamel, great workmanship ) Medal of Honor, the design of which was clearly based on the Congressional Medal of Honor. This was given in 1917 to Dame Leila PAGET , whose leadership of a Serbian Relief Fund in WWI made her a world figure. She caught typhus in Serbia, and was given up for dead, but recovered and still managed to save thousands of Bulgars, Serbs, etc. Incl. are official Reports filed by this Relief Fund, and books about nursing in WWI Serbia.
C. von der GOLTZ
Telephone 773-539-5751
FAX 773-304-0131
Postal address
P.O. Box 300791, Chicago, IL 60630, USA
Electronic mail
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