5 Mark Rybnik, Steinkohlen-Gewerkschaft

Rybniker Steinkohlen-Gewerkschaft was a coal-mining cooperative operating in Rybnik, Upper Silesia — a region whose industrial output made it economically critical to Germany throughout the First World War. Notes like this one were issued in 1914 as Notgeld, emergency scrip produced by private employers and municipalities when small-denomination coinage disappeared from circulation almost immediately after war was declared, hoarded by a nervous public.

The rubber stamp and perforation cancellation were the issuer's practical authentication system, applied locally rather than at any central printing facility. Mining company scrip of this type was redeemable only within the issuer's commercial orbit — company stores, local suppliers — which kept the float manageable and the liability contained.