The treasury department has royally screwed up. As you may already know, there's a new redesign of the five dollar bill that's scheduled to be released next week. Now, this was announced months and months ago, and this is not the screw-up. What was the screw-up is that they were supposed to be, and ARE series 2006 but earlier in the year, another five, with the old design (on an unrelated note, I got an OLD OLD design series 1985 in change the other day) came out with the current secretary of the treasury and a series date of 2006. Now the reason that there are series in the first place is to distinguish changes in design. Back in the day, major changes were given new dates, and minor changes, such as the change in treasurer or treasury secretary, were given a letter. one new signature, letter, two new signatures, a new series. Change in design, such as adding "In God We Trust", also new series. In 1985, there were some minor changes in design, web press or something like that, when James Baker appointed himself secretary of the treasury [long story, very political], and ever since then, a new treasury secretary got a new series. A new treasurer only got a letter. Now when they started with the new DRASTIC [and needed] redesigns, the new bills got new series, fine. Series 2004s and 2001s were made simultaniously. However, when the new Tens came out a couple of years back, they had the series 2004A on them. There WERE no series 2004 Tens made. The treasury department made some weird excuse I forget exactly. Continuity or something. Now the new fives have the same series date as the old ones. This is more proof of incompentence by the Bush administration. If they were going to have the 2006 date as a series for the new one, fine. but why have the OLD design with the exact same series date on it? It makes no sense at all, the dates are supposed to denote when the last major change in the note was made. New DESIGN, new series. Jeez!
What the heck does this have to do with the Bush administration?!!! This is an issue with government BUREAUCRACY!!!! layers and layers of it... My point: This could happen under ANY administration! Why does everything have to be a Bush-bash? Jeez!
I went to get my car inspected in NJ on Friday but it was closed because of Good Friday. This is more incompetence on this Bush administration. How dare he close the NJ inspection centers. It was not a Federal holiday (apparantly it was a NJ one). His incompetence in allowing different holidays for states is outrageous. Now I find out he is messing with the $5 bill. What will his incompetent administration do next?
No. In the old days, *any* signature change got a letter, even if it was a change of both signatures. Witness e.g. the 1957 (Priest-Anderson) and 1957A (Smith-Dillon) $1 silvers. And the addition of IGWT didn't rate a new series designation at all; it was added in the middle of the 1935G $1 printing. (The 1934C $20's had an even bigger change to the back designs in the middle of the series; it appears that changes affecting only the back side of a note are ignored for series-dating purposes.) You want William Simon in 1974 and not James Baker in 1985, but yes, that's the modern system. (For a few years they couldn't seem to make up their minds; 1977 follows the 1974 rule, but 1977A went back to the old-fashioned way. Since 1981 it's been consistent.) And the web press was in 1992, and unrelated (though one could argue that the web notes should really have had their own unique series dates, since they're from a completely different master die than everything else, just like the 1935/1957 changes...). This often happens with gradual redesigns. The first 32-subject $50's and $100's were Series 1963A; those two denominations were never printed as Series 1963 since their new designs weren't ready until there'd already been a signature change. The 1928 series did work differently, with each denomination getting its own sequence of series letters, but that was confusing.... This is admittedly rather bizarre. Normally one of the series dates gets fudged to avoid such a conflict--this is why the first big-head $100's are Series 1996 (they should've been 1995 but that was already taken) and why the first Kodachrome $20's are Series 2004 (should've been 2003, and were even put into circulation in 2003, but again that designation was already spoken for). Maybe the BEP decided they were running through the serial prefix letters too fast, and didn't want to have to use J on the new $5's? I dunno. Does seem like something's broken here, though....
I think the real outrage is that I cannot find series H $5 bills in UNC condition. I haven't even found them in AU. The handful I have found have been VF to XF at best.
This would be a great post if it didn't show such mindless bias. My question is, if these new $5.00 came out in 2008 why have 2006 on the note. I will sit back and learn.
Ideally, the series date is intended to denote the year in which the design was approved for use, not the year in which the design was released or printed.
I got one at the bank earlier in the week with a bunch of uncirculated twos, it is nice to see some colour in the fiver. But it is still a plain note.
No, in 1974 there was a new treasurer, a mrs. Neff, as well. In 1977 there were two new signatures as well.
Which is part of the Bush administration, I blame the treasurer, whatzerface. Bush has enough to screw up all by himself.
None yet, anyway. If that holds up, it'll be the first series with no stars since the 1966A $100's. But it's still possible that the BEP will decide to run off some star notes and sell them as uncut sheets, or something....
