Discipline
Exonumia
Exonumia
Exonumia is the collecting of objects that look like money or payment paper but are not federal legal tender: tokens, vouchers, chamber-of-commerce scrip, medals, and company paper. The term comes from American English and is used here with precision: 1933 Baraboo scrip is not a Federal Reserve Note or a silver certificate. It is a Chamber of Commerce bearer voucher, announced on 28 June 1933 and redeemable through 1 November that year, designed by E. B. Trimpey (Shafer WI100).
In Colombia the nearest analogue in this case is not BanRep: the 15-centavo student transport ticket is transport paper, not a Pick. Lazaretto tokens are compound money, not republican currency. Confusing exonumia with central-bank notaphily blurs both disciplines. Scrip may carry a serial and signatures — P. L. Gust and O. L. Gust at Baraboo — and still not bind a national bank. It is not an obsolete-bank remainder either: the City Bank of New Haven was a state bank; the Baraboo Chamber was not.
This collection publishes the John Ringling 5¢, serial A4895; the Chas. Ringling 10¢, A2844; the Al. T. Ringling 15¢, A2819; the A. C. Ringling 50¢, A1054; and the Ringling Bros. $1, A2002. In metal it publishes the 1834 Hard Times HT-10A token (Low-9B), the 1841 HT-16 (Low-58), the 1837 HT-34 (Low-20), and the John J. Adams store card, HT-181 (Low-300), circa 1835, all four without a serial: identity is the photographed object, not a printed number. The 25¢ Baraboo denomination waits for a serial or certificate before it receives a piece record. None of that paper or those tokens is for sale.
Exonumia covers metallic tokens and medals that are not legal-tender coin. In this case the 1834 HT-10A, the 1841 HT-16, the 1837 HT-34, and the John J. Adams HT-181 store card (all four without a serial) and 1933 Baraboo scrip (with a serial) illustrate the two ends. The Dallas $1 with Where’s George? stamps remains a legal-tender FRN: it is not classed here as exonumia, even though the stamps document it as a tracking object.
Examples in the collection
See also: Bearer note , Coscoja , Hard Times tokens , Scrip