Austrian municipal notgeld of this type emerged from a genuine coin shortage that persisted well after the First World War ended — the national mint simply could not keep pace with demand for small-denomination coinage, and hundreds of lower Austrian villages printed their own emergency paper to fill the gap. Sankt Johann am Wimberg, a small market commune in the Mühlviertel district of Upper Austria, was among them. Josef Wolkersdorfer's signature as issuing authority almost certainly reflects a mayoral or council secretary role rather than a banking function — these were municipal obligations, not bank notes.
The 1920 Austrian notgeld wave produced enormous quantities of small-denomination paper across the country, much of it deliberately collected at the time and never redeemed.
Austrian municipal notgeld of this type emerged from a genuine coin shortage that persisted well after the First World War ended — the national mint simply could not keep pace with demand for small-denomination coinage, and hundreds of lower Austrian villages printed their own emergency paper to fill the gap. Sankt Johann am Wimberg, a small market commune in the Mühlviertel district of Upper Austria, was among them. Josef Wolkersdorfer's signature as issuing authority almost certainly reflects a mayoral or council secretary role rather than a banking function — these were municipal obligations, not bank notes.
The 1920 Austrian notgeld wave produced enormous quantities of small-denomination paper across the country, much of it deliberately collected at the time and never redeemed.