coin like pieces with letters

[Robbie]

I was wondering if anyone could help tell me what these pieces could be.I found them in two different farm fields.The one with 100 on it I dug yesterday.

[coinnut]

My first guess is some kind of animal tags that never got the hole punched for usage.

[giant056]

I think it's gonna be hard finding out what they are cause I've got several that I've never been able to identify, as a matter of fact I am pretty sure that I found one identical to the FSR one but darned if I know where it's stashed, if I find it I'll let you know ???

[Robbie]

someone once told me that they are slave tokens

[milco]

Cool tokens of some kind, I would search online to see if you can find them in some of the token databases. I don't think they are animal tokens/licenses as most of those even dating back to the 1880's had the year on them.

[KCFindIt]

Interesting to me that you posted this today. I, too, found a "token" of similar nature yesterday. It is not in as good of condition, but I am able to make out several letters/words engraved on it. The word "CIGARS" is on the top line. "JOHN" is on the next line with some corrosion, then "AVIS" (The corrosion presumably covers a D?) There is more letters toward the bottom, but covered by corrosion and or more dirt i've not been able to get off. There is a round-ended slit, vertical to the lettering and off-centered toward the bottom half. My token is of square shape with rounded corners. (I'm sorry, my camera wouldn't focus enough to get a decent pic, so I scanned it.)I'm clueless!

[Robbie]

Interesting to me that you posted this today. I, too, found a "token" of similar nature yesterday. It is not in as good of condition, but I am able to make out several letters/words engraved on it. The word "CIGARS" is on the top line. "JOHN" is on the next line with some corrosion, then "AVIS" (The corrosion presumably covers a D?) There is more letters toward the bottom, but covered by corrosion and or more dirt i've not been able to get off. There is a round-ended slit, vertical to the lettering and off-centered toward the bottom half. My token is of square shape with rounded corners. (I'm sorry, my camera wouldn't focus enough to get a decent pic, so I scanned it.)I'm clueless!

Very interesting,yours looks to be made out of alum.or steel.Mine are either copper or brass.I sure do a lot of researching now that I dig up stuff.

[Digger Don]

I don't know what they are, but they are really cool finds.
I hope someone can identify them for you.

[KCFindIt]

Very interesting,yours looks to be made out of alum.or steel.Mine are either copper or brass.I sure do a lot of researching now that I dig up stuff.

I think mine is aluminum, much like rabies tags for pets. (Can't recall what the ole detector quoted me).

[KCFindIt]

I don't know what they are, but they are really cool finds.
I hope someone can identify them for you.

Since I posted the above pic/thread, I did a little researching on Cigar tokens, and while I've yet to find a duplicate of mine, I am going to guess that mine is indeed, a Cigar token. I've done some more cleaning on mine, and have exposed a "12" just to the left ofthe slit, some illegible letters to the right of the slit followed by a space, then "ST". Below the 12, are the letters "TO" to the left of the slit, and too much corrosion to the right of the slit. Nothing appears to be engraved on the reverse side.

[del]

Robbie, they look a bit small to be cattle or animal tags , and more like tokens to me as well.

[Full Metal Digger]

Nice finds. Back in the day, coinage wasn't as common as it is now. Merchants often didn't have change to give back to customers. Those look like store tokens that were made at some particular stores. The beauty of it is customers had to come back! Having tokens stamped for your business cost money but you could buy token blanks and then stamp them yourself. If you could afford to have tokens made, they usually had the full name of the proprieter or the store and the value of the token. The reverse side usually had the name of where the tokens were made. Self-made tokens usually just have initials and maybe a number for the value as it was time-consuming to make them (one punch at a time). The two scalloped ones you found are a good example of two different businesses buying the same blanks.

[Timewarpdigger]

nice finds and very interesting. Safe & HH

[coinnut]

I think they are right. Store tokens. Maybe the denominations were blank and you could stamp your own value on them?

[Robbie]

Thankyou all for information,this is a great place to turn to when one needs help.

[CTTodd]

I would say some sort of private store tokens. Nice finds for sure

[brownbeardad]

i agree with store tokens, could be from a company store. also coal companies used tokens with the man's initials as a way of determining who was still in the mine after an accident. grandpa would pick up his token and lay it in the "inside" bin as he entered for the day. and put the token back in the "out" bin after his shift was over.