Information wanted on B & H token found in Idaho

Charliesdigger

Greenie
May 19, 2014
12
33
Southwest Idaho
Detector(s) used
Garrett AT Pro
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting

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Hi Charlie, Welcome to Treasurenet and congrats on a great find, tokens are always fun. Your 12 1/2 Cent coin, also one "bit" one could say (because 25 cents is two bits) may hail from a community close to you. Where did you find it? Your local library would be a great and easy place to start, looking at 1900ish telephone and business directories for B and H. There are token collectors on this site that can help too. Best of luck, Sub 8-)
 

Charlie--What Sub says is true. I've not seen one of these B. & H. tokens before and am fairly familiar with all Idaho tokens. Tokens, of course, drift around the country, so it will help to know what part of the Great 208 you found it in. It is probably aluminum, not tin, though. 12½¢ tokens were popular all over the west, so that doesn't help. One bit was the price of a whiskey drink or a "good" cigar (as opposed to a 5¢ stogie).
John in the Great 208
 

http://tokencatalog.com/display_records.php?SearchString=B+%26+H&SubmitFilter=Search&SearchStringEveryWord=&SearchStringAnyWord=&action=DisplayRecords

A search on tokencatalog.com showed these results. A few leads but nothing definite. Not uncommon as there are definitely many undesignated tokens out there. Too many with too little information. The guys who spend all that time researching and cataloging them deserve major kudos. Anyway, great site for token info. The link leads to the search results for B & H, and there are a couple of possibles. The fourth one down, a pool hall from Buhl, Idaho seems like a possible, and the Billings, Montana and Salt Lake City tokens seem like real possibilities. However, without some research and a lucky info find, this probably goes in the unknown category. Nice find anyway! Tokens are some of the most interesting finds you can get with a detector!
 

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Thank you all for your information. I've worked my fingers to the bone looking on the Internet for any information.
 

Very cool token. Hope you're able to track it down.
 

So, Charlie - tell us in what part of the state did you find this??? That will be a clue as to where it is from.
John
 

It was found near bruneau, idaho

So within about 50 miles of Buhl. Looks like a high degree of probability that its related to the cataloged token. It might just be a coincidence, but its a heck of a starting point.
 

This evening I spoke with Richard Hansen who put the Buhl listing on tokencatalog.com and he agreed that he had mis-transcribed the photo of the known piece. It is Star, not B. & H. So, we will have tokencatalog corrected next week. Back to the drawing board... But, at least Bruneau is starting point. Thanks, Charlie!J
John in the Great 208
 

And the detectives start on a new path. One thing about realizing that a lead is incorrect, is that in itself is a important piece of info. Doesn't tell you where it came from, but eliminates a possibility.
 

Can't help you on the ID but I like it.
A one bit token is a pretty unusual find I would guess.
 

Well the mystery was solved. It's a Benham and Hyde saloon token. Was a saloon in Bruneau for about a year.
 

Fantastic,should be fairly rare in that case!
 

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