40 Heller Ostermiething

Ostermiething is a small market town in Upper Austria, and like hundreds of similar municipalities it issued Notgeld during the postwar currency emergency of 1920 — a period when small-denomination coins had effectively vanished from circulation, hoarded or melted, leaving everyday transactions impossible without local substitutes. These municipal issues were authorized under the broader Austrian Notgeld framework but designed and printed entirely at local discretion, which is why the graphic quality varies so wildly across the series.

The single Lindlbauer signature likely indicates the Bürgermeister or a designated municipal official rather than a cashier — common for smaller communities where issuing authority was concentrated in one hand.