Vintage Tin Still Bank Group — Red Circle Coffee, Nature's Remedy & Two Others

A group of four vintage advertising tin still banks, each converted from a product container with a coin slot to the lid. The standout is a Red Circle Coffee sample-size bank in yellow lithography, marked "Freshly Roasted / Ground to Order / One of A&P's Fine Coffees" with "For Savings" in red script — A&P's house coffee brand. A Nature's Remedy (NR Tablets) bank by The Lewis-Howe Company, St. Louis, carries the familiar red, black, and cream litho with full directions and the "Beware of Imitations" notice; the underside reads "Purely Vegetable — Produces No Drug Habit." A round bank illustrated with the painting of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, captioned "National Archives Building, Washington, D.C.," rounds out the patriotic theme. The fourth is an orangey-tan cylindrical tin with a black transfer scene of horse-drawn artillery and a wire bail handle.

All four are steel, maker-marked where noted in the reference photos. Promotional savings banks like these were given away or sold cheaply to encourage household thrift, and the surviving graphics span mid-century grocery, patent-medicine, and bicentennial-era advertising — a tidy cross-section of American tin lithography for the shelf or display case.

CONDITION

Good overall with visible age-appropriate wear throughout. Expect scuffing, fading, surface rust and oxidation across all four; the tan artillery tin shows the heaviest finish loss to the rims and edges. Coin slots are present on each. Sold as a group.

DIMENSIONS / SPECIFICATIONS

• Red Circle Coffee: 3 15/16" H × 2 1/4" W × 1 5/8" D
• Thomas Jefferson / Declaration: 3 1/2" H × 2"
• Nature's Remedy: 2 7/8" H × 2" W × 1" D
• Maker: The Lewis-Howe Company, St. Louis, MO (Nature's Remedy)
• Material: Steel
• Lot of 4 banks