Vintage Missouri Green Plastic Tax Tokens, Five Mills, Circa 1940s, Lot of Two

Description

Vintage Missouri Green Plastic Tax Tokens, Five Mills
Circa 1940s, Lot of Two
Missouri, like eleven other states, issued sales tax tokens during the Great Depression and World War II. These tokens were used to pay the sales tax, or they were received by the buyer as change when the tax wasn't an even cent and they didn't have tokens available.
These tokens were most likely made by Ingwersen Manufacturing Company, although a couple of other companies are also indicated as possibly manufacturing Missouri plastic tokens. The five-mill green plastic tokens were issued from 1943 to 1954. Records indicate that 109.1 million were minted. The numbers issued, redeemed and destroyed are unknown. They were demonetized on December 31, 1961.
A total of four dies were used (evident in the width of the rings around the denomination), allowing for ten possible die varieties when combining the four dies with the two faces. Furthermore, the color, opacity, and translucency vary as a result of different mixes of the plastic and dye, as well as from aging. As a result, over 50 varieties have been reported.
These tokens are about 22mm in diameter. They are Kelly green in color, and they appear to have narrow central circles. The tokens are identical on both sides, and they read properly when the tokens are flipped over on the horizontal axis. (One token is oriented properly when flipped. The other token has about a 30° rotation.)
There is no warping of these tokens. They appear to have crisp impressions and appear to be uncirculated. Please see the photos.