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50 Pfennig
| Issuer | Stadt Altona (City of Altona), Der Magistrat |
|---|---|
| Year | 1921 |
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| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Mark (1914-1924) |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Dieser Schein verliert 2 Wochen nach Aufruf in den Altonaer Zeitungen seine Gültigkeit. NOTGELD DER STADT 50 Pf. ALTONA DER MAGISTRAT. ALTONA/ELBE 12. DEZ. 1921 |
| Reverse description | The reverse carries a humorous genre-scene vignette in a bold illustrative style, signed by the artist 'Haus' in the lower right margin. Two rotund townsfolk — a man in a flat cap smoking a pipe and a stout woman in a checked skirt — stand facing one another, each clutching a small animal, with a dog and a piglet visible at their feet. The denomination '50 Pf.' is set in large type to the upper right. Two ribbon banners frame the composition, the upper inscribed 'NOTGELD STADT' and the lower 'ALTONA' in Gothic lettering, with the printer's imprint 'H.W. KOBNER & Co. GmbH' along the right margin. |
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| Comments |
Altona was not yet part of Hamburg in 1921 — that annexation came in 1937 — and the city was issuing its own emergency currency with considerable municipal pride. This note belongs to the vast wave of Kleingeldscheine that flooded German commerce as coin shortages worsened following the war, with hundreds of local authorities acting as de facto issuers out of sheer necessity rather than legal mandate.
The square format is the immediate distinguishing feature of this series. H.W. Kobner & Co. GmbH, a Hamburg-area commercial printer, produced the run — not one of the specialist note printers typically associated with the period's better-documented Notgeld issues.