Meadow Creek     Greenbrier County, West Virginia

                 Edkins Catalogue of United States Coal Company Store Scrip lists two varieties of scrip for Meadow Creek Co. at Crichton, WV.  “A” series and “B” series are the same except for the metal content.  “A” series is made of aluminum, while “B” series is made of brass.

       My examination of the pieces that I have in my Greenbrier County Coal Scrip Collection shows that there are three series.  The aluminum series (WV697A) has two different obverse dies.  Since I have not seen all denominations of $0.05 through $1.00 I can only assume that all denominations exist with the two different obverse dies.

       As you can see, both obverses have the same wording, but the town name “Crichton” is in a straight line on one aluminum $1.00 and is in a curved line on the other $1.00.  I also have both obverses of the $0.25 denomination.  My $0.50 is of the curved line variety.  I cannot tell if one variety is more common than the other.  Maybe if scrip collectors will report the varieties that they have in their collections, a better idea of the rarity can be determined.

       My collection of the brass series (WV697B) consists of all pieces $0.05 through $1.00 and are of the straight line variety.  There are some minor obverse die differences between the straight line aluminum and the straight line brass series of the $0.05 and $0.25.  This suggests that Meadow Creek Coal Company ordered scrip at least three times and new obverse dies had to be made each time.

Donald Clifford, submitted 8/06