(1836) Token HT-129A, New Orleans LA

Coin Details

Description

This 1836 copper token is a variant of the Walton Walker New Orleans issue, distinguished from HT-129 by die characteristics. The two-variety program for a single New Orleans merchant represents a typical level of investment in token advertising for Louisiana issuers, who generally maintained more modest programs than their northern counterparts. The economic conditions in New Orleans in 1836 were characterized by a cotton boom that drove land speculation, credit expansion, and commercial investment throughout the lower Mississippi Valley. Merchants who issued tokens in 1836 were operating at the peak of a speculative bubble that would burst dramatically the following year when the Panic of 1837 contracted credit, collapsed cotton prices, and disrupted the commercial networks on which New Orleans depended. Louisiana Hard Times Tokens form a small but historically significant subset of the broader series, documenting commercial life in America's second-largest port during one of the most turbulent periods in antebellum economic history.

Rarity Notes

Common. Standard copper die variant from New Orleans. Rarity R-2.

Cross References

Rulau HT-129A