Two Tokens

[drplaztics]

Here are two tokens I found the past few months in the Southern Indiana area. I found a Henry Manz in a 1888 city directory (the town in which I found it in) which says he owned a saloon and some billiard tables so I believe that is the H. Manz token. I found two of these milk tokens in the same yard about 10 feet apart and my father and I went detecting there today and I found two more milk tokens just like the other two. I'll have to find a different city/county directory to pin point this dairy and date though.

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[tokensmith]

Is the reverse of the Manz token blank?

 

[drplaztics]

The reverse side of the H. MANZ token says the exact same thing as the front (obverse the same as reverse). The reverse side of the milk token is blank with nothing printed on it. I know a local library that has a lot of city history in it so I think I'll be able to find the milk token history but I'm not sure if the R. B. stands for the name of a dairy or a 'milk man's' initials who delivered for the dairy. All four of the milk tokens look the same though.

 

[Roger Mn.]

R.B. should be the name of the dairy. Also look up R.B.milk bottles.
Those a nice tokens.
roger

 

[drplaztics]

I went to the library today to search for what the milk token stood for. Because of where the house was that I located the four tokens at were in Evansville today but the country then, the information was only listed in the 'County Directory' back then (now in town, then in the country).

The 1919 county directory lists a Rudolf Bergdolt somewhere on the same road as the house I found it and says he owned a Market Store. The 1880 county directory lists Rudolf Bergdolt as owning a Farm in the very same area at the age of 22. Being that milk was delivered straight from a farm or dairy back then rather than a grocery or market I would think he probably opened a market on his farm later on in life and maybe had milk deliveries also. Unfortunately I could find no specific information on 'dairys' or 'milk delivery services' in any book I found.