5 Cents U.S. Armed Forces Officers' Open Mess; orange

The Officers' Open Mess scrip series issued at Teheran fills a narrow but genuinely interesting gap in U.S. military monetary history. These notes circulated exclusively within the American military compound during the years of the MAAG (Military Assistance Advisory Group) and later advisory mission presence in Iran — a period when Washington maintained an extensive military footprint in the country under the Shah. Scrip of this type was used to keep hard currency off the local economy and out of the black market, a persistent problem across all U.S. overseas installations.

The Teheran mess scrip is among the rarer geographic variants from this period; the abrupt end of the American military presence following the 1979 Islamic Revolution means any unspent notes became permanently unredeemable overnight.