Bent, Old Token - Fun Research!

Early in the week I went out to do a little bit of curb stripping - spent a little over an hour and ended up with 68 cents in clad, a pair of Wheats (one was an oldie, 1919S), a smiley face pin that’s perfect for the run-up to Halloween, and the expected trash. I decided to pack up and head to one of my fields, but as I was loading my gear back into my trunk, a resident came out of one of the houses and asked about what I was finding - she was an awesome lady, genuinely interested in the history of the area and even how the detector worked, especially once I showed her some of the finds from a box I carry with me as a showcase for door knocks. Anyway, I spent about 20 minutes or so talking with her, and she ended up offering my an open invitation to detect her yard and several rental properties she owns!

I spent a couple more hours in the back portion of her lot, and within minutes I found both the Midgetoy Jeep and the cool Command Pilot Aviation wings. The wings seem like they must be some sort of sweetheart pin rather than official uniform insignia - it’s die-cast with a stick-pin style back - but still cool. Also fiound a buckle that might have some age to it, a surprising number of plumb bobs, a brass well pump fitting labeled “F.E. Myers & Bro. Co”, and a dog tag from 1978.

But the really neat find was the last of the day...I was just randomly swinging my way back to the car because I was reluctant to call it quits, but not even really attempting to achieve full coverage. I happened to hit on a faint, mid80s-low 90s signal, consistent in most directions other than some minor hiccups to upper 70s. Enough jumpiness that it could be junk, but the depth was right - showing 6”. I had to dig 8” down before the odd-shaped clump popped out of the bottom of the hole. It was hideously bent, and at first I thought it was can slaw - it was big, and the heft was clearly aluminum. But closer inspection showed it had coin-like thickness, and I could start to make out lots of lettering through the caked dirt as it dried out - trade token!

At home, it cleaned up well enough to read or infer all of the lettering despite the heavy damage. I was particularly thrilled to see that it wasn’t a maverick - unlike most of tokens I’ve found, all of the merchant’s info was present on this one! Research should be relatively easy!

A quick search from home that night on various archive sites turned up a couple newspaper articles about a fire that did significant damage to the Berndt Electric Company in the summer of 1926. The next morning, I hit the local library and searched the city directories and phone books, and found listings for the Berndt Electric Company from 1922 through 1925 - the interesting thing is that the company is listed with a Main Street address until the 1925 edition, which is the first one that lists the East Court Street address shown on the token! So it seems they moved, and that helps to date the token! The library didn’t have the 1926 directory, but the company doesn’t appear in the 1927 directory, or any directory after that. So it would seem that their move to a new address was a fateful one - I’m guessing that they never recovered from the fire in 1926, and closed shop. But that misfortune seems to lend a firm date to for the token as either 1925 or 1926 - I’d bet 1925, as it would seem natural to circulate a token advertising the new address. Kind of a high value token for that date...one dollar was a lot of money in 1926!

One of the things I noticed as I sifted through the directories - Berndt Electric had quite a bit of competition in town, at least with batteries, and the competition was advertising with large ads in the phone directory (see the cover of both directories below, and even at the bottom of the page with the Berndt listing from 1924). I never saw a single ad for Berndt Electric. Also, at first I couldn’t find his listing at all, because I went to the business listings. Berndt Electric wasn’t listed there, but his competition was. I finally found Berndt listed in the general alphabetical/residential listings. So, it may not have been the fire alone that drove Berndt out of business...

Anyway, the token is a joy to add to my collection despite the condition, and it was a blast to learn some of the history behind the short-lived business! Thanks for looking!