20 Kopecks Trial Strike

In 1956, the Soviet mint undertook a systematic program of experimental strikes testing aluminum alloys as potential replacements for the aluminum-bronze then in use for small-denomination coinage. The reforms ultimately enacted under Khrushchev's currency reorganization of 1961 went in a different direction entirely, and these trial pieces never advanced to production. Surviving examples reached Western collections almost exclusively through the hands of Soviet mint employees or later state sales — official distribution was nonexistent.