Long Service Award medals

Shuibao Liu, Sergio Da Silva, UNOG

Nowadays with the digital technology, when we buy or rent a film on DVD, we can watch not only the film itself but also the “making of”, the whole filming process and I find it particularly interesting to watch the whole process of filmmaking. Because of this, I thought that those staff members who have just received Long Service Award medals would like to know where and how they are made. Although I knew that I would not receive a medal, for lack of years of service, out of curiosity and also to make sure that the medals were well made, I volunteered, together with Sergio Da Silva, to visit the company, Faude & Huguenin SA, that produced the medals for us. It’s located in Le Locle, which is a small city some 20 km away from Neuchatel and 1000 meters above sea level (see map).
Faude & Huguenin was founded by two brothers, Fritz and Albert Huguenin in 1868. Both were young craftsmen, one an engraver, his brother an engine turner. In fact, in the beginning they set up a small workshop to decorate watchcases. In 1888 their first medal was issued. In 1934, the Company went public, becoming a limited company, Huguenin Brothers & Co. S. A. In 1955, the company stopped the watchcase business to specialize in the fabrication of medals and in 1968 became Huguenin Medailleurs S.A. Following a first merger with Kramer in 1999, the company joined with Faude in 2002, giving birth to the current name Faude & Huguenin SA. It is said that at present it is the only company in Switzerland producing medals. Therefore, you can be assured that your medals are genuinely Swiss made
and, having seen the whole process, that the quality is good.
When the Staff Council decided to offer a long service award, the Preparatory Committee considered several alternatives, such as medals, wooden carvings, etc. Once they had examined the sample medals, it was totally convinced of its choice to offer a medal to every staff member with more than 25 years of service (see article about this in last month’s issue). A second deciding factor was that we were running against time as the ceremony was scheduled for 3 February 2005, and Faude & Huguenin SA was alone in promising timely delivery. Staff representatives are proud to have been a part of the discussions leading to the introduction of this progressive entitlement and pleased that staff will now be able to benefit from improved family entitlements. Staff representatives also commend the administration for their supportive stand on this question.
However, because of the availability of the General Assembly Hall, the ceremony had to be postponed until the last day of February. Coincidently, this was the cut-off date decided upon to calculate the number of years of service, when discussions on the award began. This makes me wonder if it’s necessary for man to calculate or decide a specific date for an important event. Maybe natural calculation/decision is better than man-made. Of course our postponement suited the company as it had more time available to make the medals perfect.
Once the Committee had chosen to offer medal, the design did not take much time. The Committee shared its ideas to the designers who acted upon the suggestions, quickly giving form to our ideas. Also, the Committee was small, thus very efficient, took decisions quickly and chose an uncomplicated design.
After the design had been approved, everything thereafter was done in Le Locle. First a master die was modeled and engraved. In French this is called l’outillage (tools). Then the master die was turned into a minting die. A master die was positive while the minting die was negative. These were the initial processes for the completion and performance of the final medals.
Once the minting die was ready, the hydraulic pressing process came in. I was told that the tonnage used to press our medals was 550 tons, each medal being struck three times. After this, the excess metal had to be removed. This is called the cutting out process (découpage). During the ultimate, finishing process, our medals were either silver-plated or gold-plated, corresponding to 25 years and 30 years of service respectively. Finally, all medals were polished and beveled. As you can see, the medal in your hand is patinated on both sides and beveled on the edge, and on one side, the relief work has been polished. The size of the medal: 70 mm in diameters, 5.5 mm in thickness, weighing 150 grams.
And there you have the full production process of the medals. Rest assured that the Staff Council has the copyright of the model, therefore only the Council can order new pieces in the future, whenever it is decided to offer to staff members who achieve 25 or 30 years of service with UN. Otherwise your medal is one of only 330 pieces in the world, of which 180 are silver-plated and 150 gold-plated.