25 Pfennig - Bonn Ludwig van Beethoven

Bonn issued this notgeld piece in 1920 under the economic pressures that followed Germany's defeat — municipal iron coinage was a direct consequence of metal shortages and the collapse of centralized currency supply. The city chose Beethoven, its most commercially exploitable native son, for a coin that was as much civic branding as emergency money. Iron notgeld from this period corrodes readily, and survivors in presentable condition are rarer than mintage figures suggest.