By Peter Huntoon
Anyone who knows me knows that I am no condition crank. Paper money was made to be used. If you can’t respect that, you are in the wrong game, in my opinion
Category Archives: Reader’s Showcase
1974 $1 Off-Center Pair
By Peter Huntoon
Here is a misprint situation that I thoroughly enjoy seeing. The two notes with severely off-center overprints are from the same sheet. Fred Bart offered one on eBay that was uncirculated from the G3 plate position
Reader’s Showcase: Series of 1929 Notes
By Peter Huntoon
Pete Papadeas has been collecting layout varieties on Series of 1929 notes with particular attention to the odd fonts, special symbols, and punctuations used on New Jersey notes.
A true prize along these lines that he found are the layouts used for this Woodstown bank. The bank received printings from three different sets of 1929 plates
Reader’s Showcase: 1902 Plain Back From Key West, Fla.
By Peter Huntoon
Every once in a while, a national goes by that simply takes your breath away. This 1902 plain back from Key West is just such a note. It appeared Stack’s Bowers’ Spring 2019 Baltimore sale as lot 6008
Reader’s Showcase: Key West, Fla.
By Peter Huntoon
Every once in a while, a national goes by that simply takes your breath away. This 1902 plain back from Key West is just such a note.
It appeared Stack’s Bowers’ Spring 2019 Baltimore sale as lot 6008
Reader’s Showcase: 1929 $50 from Yankton, S.D.
By Peter Huntoon
This very attractive new-to-the-census about uncirculated 1929 $50 from Yankton, S.D., went by in both the 2019 Heritage FUN and 2019 Knight IPMS auctions
Reader’s Showcase: Perryopolis note
Peter Huntoon
There is nothing quite like landing a national from the town where you were raised, particularly if it turns out to be the first of its kind in the census. Gerald Dzara reeled in this very attractive Perryopolis note under exactly these conditions. It is the first type 2 $10 reported from the bank
Reader’s Showcase- Mt. Gilead, Ohio
by Peter Huntoon
Brett Irick sent this pair of notes that he assembled from Gilead, Ohio, (his birthplace.) Both are the only reported notes respectively from the Granite Bank and The First National Bank. The 25-cent scrip dated November 25, 1862, predates by 27 years the $5 brown back, which was printed in 1889
$2 Charter Over Seal Variety
by Peter Huntoon
Michael Scacci sent this photo of a $2 Original Series note with the scarce charter number over seal variety from a printing made for The Bristol County National Bank of Taunton, Mass., charter 766.
He was responding to my article on the variety in the January 2019 BNR
Reader’s Showcase: Kinderhook-Linderpark
by Peter Huntoon
Shown is a great pair of $2 Original Series counterfeits respectively on The National Union Banks of Kinderhook, NY, and Linderpark, NY. The first is charter 929, the second a fabricated town name. Both are listed in vintage counterfeit detectors, and both are from the same plate
Reader’s Showcase: IA-Macksburg
by Peter Huntoon
I’ve had reason to look into the smallest Series of 1929 issuances from Iowa lately and found that the four smallest were Montezuma (charter 2961) at 125 notes total, Keokuk (14309) at 135, Malvern (8057) at 228 and Macksburg (6852) at 336. I then checked the National Currency Foundation census to see if any survived. I hit goose eggs as I worked through this short list—not a big surprise—until I got to Macksburg
Reader’s Showcase $5 1902 Plain Back
by Peter Huntoon
David Grant, a serious pursuer of neat varieties issued by the largest banks in the country, bought this jewel from the largest issuer of Series of 1902 notes.
It has everything wrapped into one note: (1) engraved bank signatures, (2) B-prefix bank sheet serial number—B is the highest possible, and (3) plate letter W6—from the plate with the highest possible letter/number combination and available only from this bank.
To combine all these features in one note required that he find one of the last $5 notes issued by the bank from the 1902 series, and indeed this is exactly what he did
Reader’s Showcase MN Starbuck
by Peter Huntoon
Mark Drengson submitted this spectacular serial 1-A 1902DB from Starbuck, Minnesota. Notes from this small bank are overrepresented thanks to the Ella Overby hoard discovered in 1970 in Glenwood, Minn.
The hoard was loaded with some 140 or more high-grade Starbuck notes from the bank, which was located across Lake Minnewaska from Glenwood, but this number 1 note was not among them