5 Centimes

Vanves, a small commune immediately south of Paris, issued aluminum necessity tokens during the First World War when bronze and other metals were diverted to the war effort and the Banque de France could not adequately supply small change to local commerce. The Comité Municipal d'Approvisionnement — a municipal supply committee established to manage civilian provisioning under wartime scarcity — issued these pieces as a purely local solution to a nationwide problem. Aluminum was one of the few metals not yet subject to strict military requisition, which explains its appearance across dozens of French municipal issues from this period.