I always feel a bit lost whenever people start threads with very specific terms that leave the uninitiated totally perplexed. Then I realized that I was typing exactly such a thread! I hope this introduction will clear things up.
The Sherritt Mint - a now-defunct private mint, previously located in Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, Canada. The Sherritt Corporation has been a planchet supplier to the
Royal Canadian Mint for decades, so it was a pretty natural choice for Sherritt to set up a small mint of its own in 1966. The Mint is best-known for striking more than a thousand different types of tokens for use as temporary currency in all kinds of Canadian municipalities. While it was operating, it was the only private mint in the world to get its metal from its own mines.
The United States of America - a large country usually noted for
not being Canada.
So... yeah. I have hundreds of Sherritt-made tokens from Canadian towns, villages, and cities, and probably a hundred more similar Canadian tokens struck at non-Sherritt private mints. But my American token collection is much more dismal: I have about five American local dollar tokens. (This tells me that the local dollar trend was a lot more powerful in Canada... it also makes American tokens seem mysterious and much more desirable.) I am also interested in the Sherritt Mint because, much like me, it was located in the greater Edmonton area, and so you can find quite a few interesting Sherritt items lying around here - sometimes you'll even meet a former employee. The question burned in my mind:
did the Sherritt Mint ever produce any tokens for use south of the border?Wait! That's badly phrased.
Did the Sherritt Mint ever produce any tokens for use in the United States of America?After finding this object in a box of 50-cent tokens, I can tell you that the answer is
yes!
What makes this token a Sherritt product?
1. The 33mm magnetic planchet (made of pure nickel) was a Sherritt trademark.
2. You can spot Sherritt's mint-mark to the right of the big "1977".
This Palmer Dollar has a close resemblance to other Canadian tokens of its era, especially those from Western Canada. Here's a very similar Sherritt token, intended for use in a similar place: Williams Lake, a ranchin' rodeo town stuck in the very mountainous British Columbian interior.
Now, if you will please open up your
Red Book, somewhere near the back you will find a page dealing with "Alaska Rural Rehabilitation Corporation Tokens of 1935". Basically, in 1935, the Great Depression had caused destitution throughout most of the Western world, including the Midwest. Bankrupted families in Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan were given a unique proposition - why not move to Alaska, with help from the federal government? (Apparently there are parts of Alaska suitable for agriculture - you learn something new every day.) Hundreds of people accepted, and the Matanuska Valley Colonization Project was thus set into motion. (Listed in the
Red Book are tokens issued for use as small change at government-operated stores during the colony's first months - these will apparently run you more than $100 each.)
As it turned out, being a farmer in Alaska wasn't easy - but then, have you ever heard a pioneer story that
didn't involve hardship and misery? About 90% of the first settlers stopped working the land when conditions improved elsewhere in the country, but hundreds stayed behind (and many of those who sold their farms simply found some other kind of gainful employment in nearby Anchorage). Surprisingly, the town established by the Matanuska Valley pioneers stayed put. That settlement, Palmer, was incorporated in 1951 - today, just under 6,000 people live there.
Palmer is known for its hosting of the Alaska State Fair and the giant vegetables produced there. Although it sounds miserable, Alaska is not a bad place for growing oversized vegetables: the nearly-constant summer sunlight makes the growing season extra-productive, and many world record-holding vegetables were grown in Palmer. That's why another year's Palmer Dollar issue (which I don't own) depicts a cornucopia. And now you know why a token from Alaska depicts themes related to agriculture and rodeo...
Once again, municipal tokens prove to be an affordable alternative to more expensive kinds of tokens: for the money I would have to spend for a single 1935 A.R.R.C. token, I would probably be able to buy hundreds of Palmer Dollars and their ilk.
Now that I know what's out there, I will have to keep searching for Sherritt Mint products, even in the most improbable places...
Posted 10/01/2015 08:10 am
