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500 000 Mark
| Issuer | Kreisausschuss Schwelm (District Committee of Schwelm) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Paper |
| Size | Log in to see details |
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| Printer | Log in to see details |
| Designer(s) | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Printed in ink blue with a light blue underprint, the note bears the full text of the voucher legend in a formal letterpress typeface. A serial number in black ink appears at the lower centre. The overall design is typographic in character, without pictorial vignettes, consistent with emergency currency (Notgeld) production practice of the period. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Gutschein des Kreises Schwelm über Fünfhunderttausend Mark Nur gültig für den Geldverkehr innerhalb des Kreises Schwelm Schwelm, 10. August 1923 Der Kreisausschuss: |
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| Comments |
Schwelm is a small industrial town in the Bergisches Land, and its district committee — like hundreds of municipal and county authorities across Germany in 1923 — was forced into the notgeld business not by choice but by the complete failure of the Reichsbank to supply adequate circulating currency during the hyperinflationary collapse. The 500,000 Mark denomination, which would have seemed astronomically large just months earlier, was already losing practical purchasing power by the time issues at this level were rolling off presses.
August Schmidtmann in Barmen was a regional commercial printer, not a specialist currency house, which is characteristic of late-stage 1923 emergency issues — the dedicated notgeld printers were overwhelmed, and municipalities contracted whoever could turn work around quickly.