found a bit of Aussie history

[lazyaussie]

went out hunting yesterday & found a great piece of Australian history it a traders token actually half a token from 1860 made for Andrew, John & Co at 11 lonsdale st Melbourne who were general importers of goods, drapers, tailors. in Aussie in the 1840-50s we had a population boom due to some major gold finds people were coming from all over the world to find there fortune this put presser on an already inadequate currency supply in the colony these tokens are the answer from Aussie traders to the lack of small coinage & a great way of advertising, these tokens were made from 1850 to 1863 when Victoria declared them illegal in New south wales it was 1867 & in west Aussie 1878 so these tokens had a short time of production. there are 280 or so different verities.
as you can probably tell i love these old tokens & would have a huge collection if i had the money so far i"v accumulated 7 + this half this is my first found with a detector & I'm absolutely wrapped with it i can just imagine the last person who used it going to the shop to buy a loaf of bread giving the shop keeper a penny & being given this half of a penny in change as i said before coins were hard to come by so if you didn't have a half penny coin you cut a penny in half !!!
one of these tokens has been on my finds wish list for 4-5 years & i"m very very happy at finding one i also found a couple of 1960s Penny's & an aluminum 1952 french 5 franc coin + $6.
i"m going back to this area & digging all the targets outta the way so i can get at the deep stuff & hopefully i"ll find some more
heres the pics
lazyaussie

 

[sasquache]

wow lazyaussie those are some sweet finds im sure theres more there some where. keep up the hunt and good luck too ya

 

[John-Edmonton]

Man....you sure have been hot lately! Keep them coming

 

[Joel-Winnipeg]

Congrats on the old coin finds

 

[Uncle Willy]

Great find bud. Cutting coins was standard practice way back when everywhere.

Bill

 

[Uncle Willy]

Yeah I think he has found the secret to something. Maybe he could bottle it up and sell it.

Bill

 

[KRT (Ont)]

Great find Lazy, its always great to find something of the past. I found this penny token that had been cut and the edges filed so as to be used as a hide scraper. Almost through it away till I took a closer look at it. Seeing you are from Aussie, you may be interested in this website if you haven't already seen it. What interested me was that a bloke with the same last name as mine burried some gold on his property which is now a park bearing his name. So far no one has found it.http://www.treasureenterprises.com/Treasure%20Hunting%20Information/treasure_hunting_tips.htm

 

[John 'n' W.Va]

I learned something.

That is a coin to be proud of.

 

[Mick in Dubbo]

Well done Lazy! and thaks for the background on the tokens. I had no idea how many were in circulation.
Mick Evans.

 

[lazyaussie]

thanks all i"m hopefully going for a hunt tonight to clear some of the junk away don't think i"ll be there long as it"s 38 degrees today & i"m sweating like a pig.