Banknote Reporter April 2021

Amazingly, we are still locked in the firm grip of the COVID-19 pandemic, though the advent of approved vaccines will hopefully hasten our release. In the meantime, we can enjoy our national currency collecting by visiting small towns and seeing their national banks, then and now. In that vein, this month we’ll travel to Northeastern Pennsylvania’s Pocono Mountains region, and the quaint tourist town of Hawley. A recent trip to Winchester, Virginia, took me along a route that included Charles Town, West Virginia, and would pass historic Berryville, the seat of rural Clarke County, and with that, a revisit to a chapter from my youth. As a high school junior in the Baltimore suburbs in the late 1970’s, I was a member of our school’s AFS Club. The AFS (American Field Service)…

Carefully read the town name in the tombstone on the note illustrated on Figure 1. You are looking at the first large size national bank note where a misspelling in the town name reached circulation and has been recognized as such by its owner. This note is from Sausalito – slightly altered from sauzalito meaning “small willow grove.” I guess the engraver who mistakenly spelled it Saucalito was trying to help us Anglos out by rendering it phonetically! I got a call from Jess Lipka on February 24 who excitedly told me that he was looking at a national that he had that just didn’t look right. On giving it a closer look, he discovered that the town had been misspelled in the tombstone in the title block. Jess never calls me unless he has…

David Grant has a great eye for things that make large size notes from the nation’s biggest bank prizes to collect. He has come up with another jewel from The First National Bank of the City of New York, charter 29, the largest issuer of 1902 notes in the country. The highest sheet serial issued in the country was the 5-5-5-5 for the bank bearing serial B123785. The B-prefix reveals the bank was beginning to work through its third 1,000,000 1902 blue seal serials. The note shown here is an attractive note only 740 sheets from the last. It sports engraved signature of president J. E. Reynolds and cashier S. A. Welldon. The plate position letter is U6, top subject of the highest number plate anywhere in the country from…

This is an item from page 23 in: Hall, Alvin W., 1931, Annual report of the Director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing: Government Printing Office, Washington, DC. In all my digging in old Federal records archives during the past 50 years, I have never come up with a proof from a Series of 1929 overprinting plate that was used. Proofs from the Surface Printing Division at the Bureau were rarely saved so only a few odds and ends from that division are among the certified proof holdings in the National Numismatic Collection of the Smithsonian Institution, none being 1929 overprints. Imagine the information that would have been in this trove in the way of bank signatures and title block layouts!…

NOTE: This article is the first of three articles that will be discussing the paper currency of Surinam. Here we will cover the early years of the card money, also the two earliest bank issues of 1826 and 1829-1847, and the interim period before the formation of the Surinaamsche Bank in 1865. When one thinks of South America, the image of Latin-language countries takes over, and you don’t ever stop to realize that on that continent there are also several areas where European languages and thoughts are the norm. These are the three small states on the east coast: the Guianas. Surinam is the name of the enclave of South America that mostly belonged to the Netherlands from its hesitant inception in the 1680’s to the granting of full independence in 1975.…

There are some really great notes being offered in the March 2021 Stack’s Bowers auction. I was just thrilled to peruse the catalog and see all of the iconic and celebrated types included. I am eager to review the prices realized after the sale. One of the most prolific notes is Lot 3166, a US $100 1863 Spread Eagle Legal Tender note graded by PCGS a Choice Uncirculated 63. The eagle vignette engraved by Joseph P. Ourdan is highly regarded by collectors. The note has two printed serial numbers on it and the signatures of Chittenden and Spinner. Estimated at $300,000 - $400,000 this one will be one to watch. Another notable offering is Lot 3277. An 1890 $100 Treasury Note graded by PCGS Choice Extremely Fine 45. The zeros on the…