50 Pfennig

Olpe's 1921 Pfennig notgeld came out of the postwar municipal emergency that forced hundreds of small German cities to issue their own fractional currency when coin shortages made everyday commerce nearly impossible. Carl Schleicher & Schüll of Düren were among the most prolific notgeld printers of the period, supplying dozens of municipalities across the Rhineland — their output was competent and consistent, which is precisely why so many of these small-town issues are difficult to distinguish from one another without checking the issuer text carefully.

Olpe's issues are modestly scarce compared to larger Westphalian cities, largely because the town's population was small and distribution was correspondingly limited.