Posted 10/17/2013 5:48 pm
Very very good for $2. Much nicer than the one I had. My records have kind of peetered off for Conders, but my Liverpool is listed there as costing me £2.14 and I eventually sold it for £4.14 - the picture of mine has gone AWOL. I might try and input allt he other tokens I've got since then (ive got some real interesting stuff).
Background: For some reason, the mint stopped issuing Copper coins. This had happened before in the Civil war period (and after that) - at this time, each town and hamlet produced crude hammered coinage which is pricey and popular because nearly every town issued tokens and even if you live in a teensy little village, you can find one issued by your community (mine issued so many variants - itd cost a mint to get all the different issuers - there are 17 and the most common will set you back £20-£30). Ooh I could write for a long time about the tokens from my town.
Now that it was happening again, traders took it upon themselves to fill the gap. This started with a rare issue which I wont go into, but got going when John Wilkinson and the Anglesey Mines started issuing copper currency (mostly to pay their workers). The economy suffered with the lack of coinage and soon many people were issuing their tokens - from small businesses to major political figures. The soho mint, among others, took advantage of this - they struck the coinage for many of the issuers and realised the collectors value - they sold collctors items and produced mules. Some funny tokens are made - theres one with the dwarf Sir Jeff Dunsten, Mayor of Garrett, a gag mayor in a gag election held yearly at the time.
Collectors items often came in the form of 1 penny tokens with ludicrously small issues. The one for my town (which is beautiful and abotu 4 are known) is worth £200-500 and is only known in BU Red condition. It was sold as a collectors item from the mint and shows our beautiful castle - it might, in fact, be the oldest proper image of it (true to life...the trade tokens of the 17th century show a stylised castle).
If you live in the old new world, you might live in a town named after a UK town. You should find the 17th Century token and 18th century tokens to match them (I warn you, some 17th century tokens are incredibly rare and hardly ever seen outside museums...).
OH, and a note as to why they are called 'Conder Tokens'. the first collector of these tokens was James Conder. He wrote the first catalogue for them. If you have deep pockets, you could buy the token that he himself issued (its hardly rare, but it is popular).
Background: For some reason, the mint stopped issuing Copper coins. This had happened before in the Civil war period (and after that) - at this time, each town and hamlet produced crude hammered coinage which is pricey and popular because nearly every town issued tokens and even if you live in a teensy little village, you can find one issued by your community (mine issued so many variants - itd cost a mint to get all the different issuers - there are 17 and the most common will set you back £20-£30). Ooh I could write for a long time about the tokens from my town.
Now that it was happening again, traders took it upon themselves to fill the gap. This started with a rare issue which I wont go into, but got going when John Wilkinson and the Anglesey Mines started issuing copper currency (mostly to pay their workers). The economy suffered with the lack of coinage and soon many people were issuing their tokens - from small businesses to major political figures. The soho mint, among others, took advantage of this - they struck the coinage for many of the issuers and realised the collectors value - they sold collctors items and produced mules. Some funny tokens are made - theres one with the dwarf Sir Jeff Dunsten, Mayor of Garrett, a gag mayor in a gag election held yearly at the time.
Collectors items often came in the form of 1 penny tokens with ludicrously small issues. The one for my town (which is beautiful and abotu 4 are known) is worth £200-500 and is only known in BU Red condition. It was sold as a collectors item from the mint and shows our beautiful castle - it might, in fact, be the oldest proper image of it (true to life...the trade tokens of the 17th century show a stylised castle).
If you live in the old new world, you might live in a town named after a UK town. You should find the 17th Century token and 18th century tokens to match them (I warn you, some 17th century tokens are incredibly rare and hardly ever seen outside museums...).
OH, and a note as to why they are called 'Conder Tokens'. the first collector of these tokens was James Conder. He wrote the first catalogue for them. If you have deep pockets, you could buy the token that he himself issued (its hardly rare, but it is popular).
