Medal

Description

This commemorative brass medal was created for the June 1911 Cotton Centennial Carnival, held in Fall River, Massachusetts. The Cotton Centennial Carnival was a week-long fair celebrating the 100th anniversary of Fall River’s cotton industry, marked by when the city’s first cotton mill was built in 1811. The fair included parades, tours of the city’s cotton mills, and a visit from President William Taft. The scenes on this medal celebrate the growth of Fall River’s cotton industry, and, by extension, the growth of the city itself. One side shows the city’s first cotton mill, a single building by a river. The other side shows the same location as it was in 1911, a bustling harbor with ships and a factory-filled skyline. The factories are shown with prominent smokestacks billowing smoke into the air – a symbol, at the time, of industrial prowess. This object is one of a large group transferred to Winterthur from the American Textile History Museum when it closed in 2017.