1 Franken Saint Gobain

Saint-Gobain's Stolberg branch — part of the French glassmaking and chemicals giant that traces its origins to a 1665 royal monopoly — issued this 1 Franken note during the Rhineland occupation period, when the region's peculiar status under Allied control created genuine ambiguity about which currency should circulate. Denominating in francs rather than marks was a practical acknowledgment of that reality, not a political statement.

H. Willmars printed this locally in Stolberg, a detail worth noting given that many Rhineland emergency issues of this period were farmed out to larger presses. The watermarked paper suggests a more deliberate production than typical notgeld.