A rare collection of medals documenting the history of agricultural shows and rural industries across Australia is now part of the National Museum of Australia’s collection.
The museum acquired 111 medals from the David Allen collection at auction in November 2011.
Aldinga Annual Ploughing Match medal 1853.
According to the National Museum, many of the medals are associated with significant individuals and organisations.
These include the Port Phillip Farmers Society, which was formed in 1848 by a group of farmers on Moonee Ponds Creek.
You might say it was the original version of the state farmer federations we know today.
As gold-rush Victoria boomed, the society was the only organisation in the colony that was interested in the affairs of the farmer.
In 1855 the society convinced the Victorian government to make its first contribution to aid agriculture in the colony, an amount of 500 pounds to supplement prizes as the annual show and ploughing matches.
It also successfully lobbied government to develop a Government Experimental Farm, which opened at Dookie in the Benalla district in 1877, and worked to convince government to establish a Board of Agriculture and contribute to various competitions to improve stock and crops.
This successful attraction of government support probably paid for the medals, which have now been obtained by the museum.
I haven’t seen agricultural medals before, but in my coin collection I have a Sunday School medallion from the 19th century that looks like a large bronze coin.
The original collector of the medals, David Allen, was a numismatist and little is known of each medal’s provenance before he acquired them.
The museum is therefore seeking public assistance to identify the medals and tell their stories.
All the medals can be seen here. Information about them can be emailed to curator@nma.gov.au.
Here is an interview given by Dr Martha Sears, from the National Museum of Australia, to ABC Radio:
