A Little Chunk o' History

A few weeks ago, I mentioned that I moved into a new office. During that move, I did a lot of cleaning out of drawers of old desks, making sure we didn't throw away any important documents or other stuff. Deep in the back of one desk drawer was a coin. At first glance, I thought it was merely a recent 10 Pfennig coin that was all over the place before the Euro came along. Then I noticed the date (1949) and the words (Bank Deutscher Länder). This coin is from before the current Germany existed! Cool!
Here are pictures, with a more recent "Bundesrepublik Deutschland" 10 Pfennig coin, of the front and back of both. The differences are quite subtle, at least to my untrained, non-coin-collecting eye.


Barely any difference.


The difference is quite subtle.