Referred to as rewards of merit, several hundred examples of these tokens of students' progress and teachers' approval are part of the Dr. Richard Lodish American School Collection, and I have had the opportunity to work with many of them—especially those from the mid-to-late 19th century. While some rewards of merit are medallions and pins, most of these rewards are small pieces of paper with either hand-drawn or printed decoration. Some are elaborately ornamented with illustrations and color, while others are simpler, with only the words "Reward of Merit" and the student's name. While the styles vary, each reward had an important meaning for the student: the recognition of a teacher, approval of parents, and establishment among peers.

I had helped put together the 1994 book mentioned in this blog post, “Rewards of Merit” by Patricia Fenn and Alfred P. Malpa. Al Malpa is a friend who collected mostly paper rewards of merit, so I helped him with the medals part, both the information and the photos. All of the medals (except for one, from Pat Fenn’s family) in that book are in my collection. At the time, it was half mine and half Al’s (with most of those from Rocky Gardiner’s collection), but I bought all of his medals not too long after the book was published.

Dave Bowers helped me arrange for Cathy Dumont to take the photos, so she and I spent an afternoon in the basement of the Bank of Boston building in downtown Boston, where I had a safe deposit box, doing the photography. I learned a LOT about medal photography that day.