Jorge Proctor writes:

The 'gold' ticket (one of only two issued) is actually made of silver and is very similar to the 50 silver tickets except it has the word 'Bearer' rather than 'Proprietor' on it and is not numbered.

The tickets donated by Mrs Menez are accompanied by histories of their previous ownership, such as a bill of sale for one silver ticket at a cost of £20 dated 20 September 1855, and also include one of only two 'gold' versions ever issued. They will join the five silver tickets already held by the Theatre Collection, which is also home to the Bristol Old Vic Archive.

Fifty of the 'tickets' were originally awarded in the 1760s to the fifty proprietors who each pledged £50 towards the cost of building a new theatre in King Street. This was at a time when a low paid domestic servant earned £2 a year and an entire family household could be run on £40 per year.

The tickets took the form of a silver token, numbered between 1 and 50, which entitled the proprietor "to the sight of every performance to be exhibited in this house" - a promise the theatre honours to this day.

In 1766, two so-called 'gold' bearer tickets were also issued to Edward Crump, a cabinet maker, and his wife Ann. The Crumps were not shareholders, but were given the special bearer tickets for "the great trouble and expense" that Crump had gone to in order to persuade others to make over the land on which the theatre was built. The whereabouts of these 'gold' tickets (which are actually made of silver and very similar to the 50 shareholder tickets) has been unknown - until now.

Mrs Menez also donated the hand-drawn plans for the re-modelling of the frontage of the theatre in 1902, carried out by her great-grandfather, the builder, Henry Forse. These plans provide important information about parts of the theatre that were demolished in the 1970s. Forse was passionate about the theatre and it was he who collected the four tickets and other historic documentation and handed it down through his family.

To read the complete article, see:
Old Vic silver tickets come home to Bristo (www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2015/june/old-vic-silver-tickets.html)

For images of the normal tickets, see:
Theatre token (front) (http://discoveringbristol.org.uk/browse/slavery/theatre-token-front)
Theatre token (back) (http://discoveringbristol.org.uk/browse/slavery/theatre-token-back)

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
'GOLDEN TICKET' TOKEN STILL GOOD AFTER 250 YEARS (www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v18n27a12.html)

To read the complete article, see:
250-year-old Bristol Old Vic "golden ticket" found (www.bristolpost.co.uk/250-year-old-Bristol-Old-Vic-golden-ticket/story-26798905-detail/story.html)

Jorge writes:

To read the complete article, see:
Bristol Theatre Tokens (www.tokenpublishing.com/news.asp?gid=13&nid=436)

To read the complete article, see:
BRISTOL OLD VIC RECOGNISES MERCHANTS' GIFT WITH HISTORIC SILVER TOKEN (http://merchantventurers.com/bristol-old-vic-recognises-merchants-gift-with-historic-silver-token/)