50 Pfennig - Kornwestheim

Kornwestheim issued this zinc notgeld piece in 1918 as the German imperial coinage system buckled under wartime metal requisitions. Copper and nickel had been redirected to munitions production years earlier, forcing municipalities across Württemberg to strike their own emergency currency in whatever base metals remained available. Zinc was far from ideal — it corrodes readily and strikes poorly — but it was what the foundries had.

The Funck reference places this among the better-documented Württemberg municipal issues, though zinc survivors in problem-free condition are genuinely scarce given the metal's vulnerability to environmental damage over a century of storage.