50 Pfennig - Erfurt Henry Pels and Co.

Henry Pels & Co. was an Erfurt-based tobacco and cigarette manufacturer that issued this zinc notgeld token during the acute coin shortage of World War I, when the Imperial government's wartime metal requisitions stripped copper and nickel from civilian circulation almost entirely. Zinc, a material with no meaningful pre-war role in German coinage, became the default fallback for municipal and commercial token issuers across Thuringia and beyond.

The Menzel reference numbers indicate this is the third die variety catalogued for this specific type — a detail worth noting for series collectors.