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50 Pfennig
| Issuer | Gemeinde Ruß (Municipality of Ruß) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1920 |
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| Printer | Otto Sekunna & Sohn, Heydekrug, Germany |
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| Obverse description | Green letterpress-printed Notgeld on cream paper, framed by a wavy outer border and an inner guilloche underprint pattern. The issuer name 'Gemeinde – Ruß' is set in bold Gothic blackletter at the top, flanked by the numeral '50' in each corner; a large blackletter inscription 'Fünfzig Pfennig' dominates the centre, above which a handwritten serial number is printed. Below the denomination, a three-line guarantee text and place-date line read 'Ruß, den 1. Juli 1920', followed by the authority line 'Der Gemeindevorstand' and a manuscript ink signature. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Green letterpress reverse on cream paper, sharing the same wavy border and dotted guilloche underprint as the obverse, with a lightly printed 'Gemeinde Ruß' watermark-style underprint visible at centre. The heading 'Gemeinde – Ruß / Memelgebiet.' appears at the top in Gothic blackletter; the denomination is restated as 'Fünfzig' above the numeral '50' and 'Pfennig' below, flanked symmetrically by ornamental fleur-de-lis vignettes in rectangular panels at left and right. A validity clause at the foot restricts circulation to the Landgemeinde Ruß, and the printer's imprint 'Otto Sekunna & Sohn, Heydekrug.' appears along the bottom margin. |
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| Comments |
Ruß — today the Lithuanian village of Rusně — sits on the Nemunas delta, a few kilometers from the Baltic. This note was issued in 1920 during the brief and legally ambiguous period when the Memelland had been detached from Germany by the Treaty of Versailles but had not yet been formally assigned to any state. The Allied administration wouldn't arrive until late 1920, and French governance followed in 1921, making this a note issued in a political vacuum by a municipality that wasn't entirely sure who it answered to.
The printer, Otto Sekunna & Sohn, was a local Heydekrug firm — small-town emergency money, not a specialist security printer. Notgeld from communities this size and this far into the northeastern periphery survives in genuinely limited numbers.