12 Cents Ohio Sales Tax Receipt

Ohio was among the earliest U.S. states to adopt a general sales tax, doing so in 1934, and these receipts were issued as physical proof of tax collected on small purchases — a system that required merchants to buy receipt books and issue them to customers at point of sale. The Columbian Bank Note Company, a Chicago-based security printer active through much of the early-to-mid twentieth century, handled production, accounting for the watermarked paper.

The 12-cent denomination reflects the tax collected on a specific purchase amount rather than a face-value currency figure — these circulated not as money but as fiscal vouchers, and most were discarded after use, which makes intact examples genuinely uncommon.