This picture gallery accompanies the article entitled ‘Economy and ethics in the cosmic process’ by Chris Hann. The article was published in issue 28:1 of JRAI and is available here.
The images in this gallery were projected as background illustrations during Chris Hann’s Huxley Memorial Lecture, delivered at the British Museum on 18 December 2019. Hann’s subject was how a socialist institution, namely the state farm (Russian sovkhoz), had transformed a backward region (puszta) south of the Hungarian capital during four decades of socialism (from 1949). He is grateful to Aurél Szakál, Director of the Thorma János Múzeum in Kiskunhalas, for permission to reproduce these images. Some represent the central market town (commonly abbreviated as Halas), while others were taken in outlying settlements on the puszta such as Tájó and Kunfehértó, 20 km distant. Some of these photographs belong to the Museum’s general collections, but most have been selected by Hann from annual scrapbooks made available to him by the Museum in August-September 2019. These large albums were compiled by farm workers (probably for the most part its cultural officials) for their own purposes and stored for posterity. The selection is intended to give some idea of the world that was lost when the Kiskunhalas State Farm (hereafter KSF) disintegrated in the 1990s. All images courtesy of the Thorma János Múzeum, Kiskunhalas.
1. A poor peasant family poses for the photographer Jenő Csolnoky on the sandy landscape typical of the western zone of the Great Hungarian Plain (Danube-Tisza interfluve) (1903)
2. Peasant technology for levelling the sand dunes before the impact of mechanization in the course of socialist collectivization (1958)
3. An isolated farmhouse prior to modernization of this sandy zone (1962)
4. An early hog-breeding complex of the KSF (1952)
5. Threshing using older, pre-socialist technology (1952)
6. The New Year’s Ball at KSF headquarters (1958)
7. Tractors for the KSF were manufactured in Kiskunhalas at a new factory established by the well-known Budapest-based enterprise Ganz (1964)
8. Urban schoolchildren at a KSF youth camp (1966)
9. The new headquarters of the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party in Kiskunhalas (1969)
10. Constitution Day (20 August), celebrated with political speeches in the culture hall of the KSF. The text reads ‘In the Hungarian People’s Republic all power lies with the working people’ (1971)
11. Links to a state farm in Crimea were close. The caption at this political meeting reads ‘We warmly welcome the delegation of our sister farm at Simferopol. Long live Hungarian-Soviet friendship’ (1971)
12. New KSF winery at Balotaszállás (1970-1)
13. Gathering for a ‘subbotnik’ (‘communist Saturday’ – when workers volunteered their labour without remuneration) (1972)
14. A large-scale vineyard of the Tajó unit of the KSF; the writing refers to a ‘pest management competition’ (between brigades) (1972)
15. Spraying vineyards by helicopter (1973)
16. Following economic reforms, the KSF was allowed to import technology from the West: here grape harvesting equipment (1973)
17. Laboratory research in an ancillary unit of the KSF that collaborated closely with a pharmaceutical enterprise in the capital (1973)
18. ‘Subbotnik’ for harvesting apricots at Tájó (1974)
19. A local anniversary exhibition of KSF products (mainly alcoholic beverages); the text reads ‘The Kiskunhalas State Farm, founded 25 years ago, has played its part in the development of the town, provided jobs for its inhabitants, and contributed significantly to the provisioning of the population of the country’ (1974)
20. KSF wine exhibition (1974)
21. ‘Subbotnik’ to harvest grapes at Kunfehértó (1977)
22. Schoolchildren harvesting grapes at Kunfehértó (1977)
23. Packaging medicines at the KSF’s pharmaceutical unit at Kunfehértó (1981)
24. The new winery at Tajó (1981)
25. This engraving of Charles Darwin by Pál Szilágyi was awarded a prize by KSF cultural officials (1981)
26. Political ritual was still important in the 1980s. 4 April was a public holiday to commemorate Hungary’s liberation by the Red Army in 1944-5. It was abolished and replaced by new rituals after 1990. Here the KSF workforce waits expectantly (1982)
27. This ritual had a strong military character: paramilitary groups of the KSF march past the political leaders (1982)
28. The KSF leadership assembled under the flags of Hungary and the USSR; the plaques and wreaths commemorate the sacrifices made for socialist freedom (1982)
29. Apart from their collective function, the merits of individuals were also formally recognized on these occasions (through the presentation of a badge, book, or certificate) (1984)
