British gas meter coins

[villa66]

Great Britain’s big bronze pennies of 1860-1970 were, in their heyday, among the world’s best recognized and most useful coins.

The big pennies went around the globe to work in the various parts of the Empire, and at home in England—at the center of Empire, at the center of Europe, and perhaps, near the end of the 19th century, at the center of the world—the British penny of Victorian times was an everyday coin, engaged in everyday work.

Huge numbers of these coins were being used in the “penny-in-the-slot” gas meters that were multiplying across London and elsewhere. So rapidly were gaslights being installed in British homes, and so many more gas-ovens being used to bake bread in British homes, that British copper coin production was tripling about the time this 1896 penny was struck.

Pennies by the many tens of millions were being used in these “penny-in-the-slot” gas meters, and would be for more than a half century. Inflation, however, would take its usual toll....

[villa66]

The amount of gas that a penny could purchase declined through the ‘20s and ‘30s until by the 1940s the “penny-in-the-slot” gas meters increasingly accepted 1-shilling coins as well.

By the time this 1953 (English reverse) shilling appeared in Elizabeth II’s Coronation year, 1-shilling pieces were Britain’s predominant “gas meter” coin. Shillings—not pennies—were the coins that were kept in a jar in British kitchens to feed the gas meter, and when a household got caught short, it was a shilling or two that someone went next door to borrow....

[villa66]

The switch to shillings caused a large surplus of pennies, which were struck in smaller and smaller numbers during the late 1940s and early 1950s. After the 1953 pennies of Elizabeth II—perhaps struck for ceremonial reasons as much as anything else—production of British pennies was suspended.

The hiatus lasted the remainder of the decade. Not until these 1961 pennies would the series see a new date....

[villa66]

This 1960 halfpenny is not obviously a “gas meter” coin, but it is, nevertheless. About 1963—or so I’ve read—many tens of thousands of these coins were being returned to the Royal Mint because they had been filed down for use as shillings in gas meters!

It was something I read about 15 years ago, and had almost forgotten....

[villa66]

But look what showed up in an American coin-dealer’s junkbox a month ago, a month after I had found an identical piece in a dealer’s junkbox 150 miles (240km) away:

A 1960 halfpenny sheared to the diameter of a shilling, and plated to mimic the color of a shilling. A British “gas meter” coin of private manufacture, a “faux” shilling!

v.

[KarlAntonMartini]

Danke für diese Geschichte! Grüße, KarlAntonMartini

[leodux]

Hi villa66,

although I don't collect modern coins, that's really interesting to read.
Thank you for sharing your information!

Peter

[Rial]

Thank you for the nice history ...

Sehr schöner Beitag.
Die alten Pennys haben auch ein zeitloses Design gehabt.
Hätte gern eine mit George IV in guter Erhaltung ...

[sigistenz]

Guck mal in eBay UK

http://coins.shop.ebay.co.uk/Milled-181 ... 86.c0.m282

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[rifki59]

ich habe 1924 und 1921 half penny , möchte wiossen ob sie wert haben. danke

[KarlAntonMartini]

ich habe 1924 und 1921 half penny , möchte wiossen ob sie wert haben. danke

Das hängt ganz von der Erhaltung ab. Zwischen 0 und 45 Pfund.