50 Heller Altheim

Altheim's 50 Heller note belongs to the vast Austrian Notgeld wave that followed the collapse of the Habsburg monarchy — small municipalities across Upper Austria printing their own emergency money between 1919 and 1921 to address the catastrophic small-change shortage left by wartime coin hoarding and metal requisitioning. J. Stampfl of nearby Braunau handled the printing, keeping production strictly local. Three municipal officials signed each note: the Bürgermeister, his deputy, and a single Gemeinderat — the minimum quorum Altheim's administration could muster for the purpose.