Collection Highlights - Train Tokens -
I got these as part of the collection that I got from my grandfather or great-grandfather. When he was younger and first married he lived out in New York and moved here for a job opportunity at some point. These are a couple of cool train tokens that must have been used to show that you purchased a fair then we're allowed to ride. Well these are not silver, one is German silver which is basically just a fancy way of saying shiny nickel metal. But I like them because they got me looking for unique things like this in coin shops. I have managed to find other similar tokens for the small towns that I visit or live in an area, and I think they are cool piece of history that is much more local than some of the typical government issued money.
1 Fare - Triple Cities Traction Corp. Binghamton, New York
I have to assume that the triple cities traction Corp was a train, but I couldn't find anything to prove it wasn't possibly a bus? The link on new mista doesn't really have much information and it appears to me that this token is probably unused since it doesn't have a hole in the middle like the other one. It must have been expensive for them to mint these tokens and discard them after each use. They're pretty small since they're only 16 mm they remind me roughly the size of a dime or smaller.
1 Fare - Binghamton Railway Co. Binghamton, NY.
The Binghamton railway token is very similar to the triple cities although this one has a hole in the middle. I'm not sure if this hole was part of the token or this was placed here after the token is used. For some reason I feel like they punched a hole in a token after it was used so you couldn't get multiple rides out of one token but I'm not sure where I heard that. This token is also from the Bing and Tim New York area, in fact both the tokens were so they must have been competing trains there. This one has a bit more detail in it as the back ground design goes all the way through the center of the coin while the other TCT coin is smooth around the lettering.
While these might not be really cool for others, knowing that they are used by my grandfather or great-grandfather and then moved here with them makes them special to me. I also like the fact of finding these old tokens that were used, especially in local areas. It kind of reminds me of finding the local Federal reserve notes when there were more regional banks.
