MONEY, CHESS
During the First World War, because of the shortage of metal in Germany, paper money was used, and in the villages of Konigsaue and Ströbeck currency was printed with a chess theme.
In Konigsaue paper currency showed a chessboard divided into 4 quarters, each quarter labeled 10 pfg [pfennig]. The chessboard either showed a chess position covering the whole board, or each corner of the board showed an individual position.
Ströbeck, the famous chess village in Germany, where every man, woman and child is said to play the game, printed money in denominations of 25 pfg, 50 pfg and 75 pfg with a chess picture or cartoon. One cartoon shows Uncle Sam hammering across a pathway of stars and stripes at a King with a battering ram, labeled the 14 points of the Versailles Treaty and named Fool's Mate; another shows Bismarck as World Chess Champion, and a third shows the historical chess castle of the village in the background, with the agriculture and industry of the village in the foreground, labeled Nature's Chess Board.

December 31, 1921 Germany - Konigsaue 

December 31, 1921 Germany - Ströbeck