OBSOLETE PAPER MONEY
From NBSwiki
The One Hundred Greatest Items Of United States Numismatic Literature Rank: Number 77
The National Bank Act of 1863 and subsequent acts effectively removed non-federal currency from circulation and introduced a uniformity of paper money which persists to the present day. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing, the paper money collector’s version of the first United States Mint, commenced operations in 1862 and quickly centralized the business of the nation’s paper money. The pre-story, conversely, is spread over a multitude of independent banks, journeyman engravers, persistent counterfeiters, and an alphabet soup of predecessor firms which ultimately formed the American Bank Note Company. Such disparate investigations are outside the hands of most researchers, and we are fortunate that we have a Dave Bowers to put the whole story together. The result is a comprehensive overview of the creation, production, circulation and redemption of obsolete paper money, and along the way are the delightful sideways glances for which Bowers is famous. The most interesting here is the story of the American Bank Note Company archives, not to mention an in-depth view of the Carroll County (NH) bank, from which a great amount of archival material has survived. Combined with a micro view such as Haxby's A Standard Catalog Of United States Obsolete Bank Notes, 1782-1866 (#50), the Bowers volume will serve the obsolete paper money collector to great advantage.
1st Edition
Photo courtesy of Whitman Publishing.
Bowers, Q. David. OBSOLETE PAPER MONEY ISSUED BY BANKS IN THE UNITED STATES 1782-1866.
Atlanta: 2006
616pp, illustrated
Quarto
Hardbound: Pictorial boards
1st Edition, Deluxe
Photo courtesy of Whitman Publishing.
Bowers, Q. David. OBSOLETE PAPER MONEY ISSUED BY BANKS IN THE UNITED STATES 1782-1866.
Atlanta: 2006
616pp, illustrated
Quarto
Hardbound: Brown leather, lettered in gilt