Orders, Decorations & Medals - Aust Singles

Lot 3558    Session 13 (2.30pm Thursday 22nd November)    Orders, Decorations & Medals - Aust Singles

Estimate $2,000
Bid at live.noble.com.au
SOLD $5,400

ORDER OF AUSTRALIA, Companion (AC) (Civil), neck badge in 18ct gold and enamel, hallmarked for London by medallist, 'SD' (Stuart Devlin). Peter Abeles on reverse. Pantographed. Nearly uncirculated.

Together with case of issue marked on lid, 'A.C.'; one wide and one thin neck ribbon; riband bar; miniature medal with ribbon brooch suspender; missing lapel badge; also unidentified mini lapel badge (damaged).

Sir Emil Herbert Peter Abeles was born in Vienna, Austria on 25 April 1924. The family, which was Jewish, fled to Hungary when he was a young boy to escape the rise of facism. When the Nazis invaded Hungary in 1944 his family fled to Romania but he was taken to a death camp. Fortunately they all survived and were re-united after the war but the upsurge in communism post war forced the family to flee and in 1949 Peter, aged 25, arrived in Australia as a refugee.

In the ensuing years he, along with a fellow Hungarian, established a trucking company called Alltrans. By 1967 the company had expanded to run over 500 trucks and had merged with TNT (Thomas National Transport) and in the following year Peter Abeles was appointed managing director. During the 1970s the company expanded world-wide and in 1979, in an alliance with Rupert Murdoch's News Limited, they took over Ansett Transport Industries, one of the two major airlines in Australia and by the mid-1980s TNT was the second largest transport empire in the world. The NSW Askin government recommended him for a knighthood and he was appointed a Knight Bachelor for services in transport, charities and universities (Supplement to London Gazette 1 January 1972, p2).

In 1987 Peter Abeles was named Australian of the Year by The Australian newspaper. He also chaired the Trade Advisory Council and the Australian Opera Foundation. On Australia Day 26 January 1991 Emil Herbert Peter Abeles was appointed Companion of the Order of Australia in recognition of services to industry to Government and to the community. In the 1990s he retired as managing director of TNT but was appointed to the board of directors.

Sir Peter Abeles established and chaired the Australian Cancer Research Foundation but ironically he died of cancer in Sydney, NSW on 25 June 1999.