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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;johnmilton, post: 24634964, member: 101855&quot;]I know that most people tell you to specialize. Otherwise you wonder off in all sorts of directions. I have long been a wonderer.</p><p><br /></p><p>I don’t collect a great deal of paper money, but I do have a type set of U.S. Fractional Currency that I assembled in the late 1980s and early ‘90s.</p><p><br /></p><p>I was looking at the collection yesterday and reading the <u>United States Currency</u> book by Ken Bressett when I ran into this quote that appeared in the <i>Washington Star</i> newspaper.</p><p><br /></p><p><i>“In 1862 small change became very scarce … It was more than a day’s search to find a silver five cent piece.”</i></p><p><br /></p><p>That got me to thinking about the type coins I have and the Fractional Currency. Here is an example of the “elusive silver five cent piece.”</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567337[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>The Union Government&#039;s first answer for a replacement was this, the Postal Currency a.k.a. the first issue of Fractional Currency. The first pieces had perforated edges for separating the notes like stamps. Technically this piece is a stamp.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567338[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1567339[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>Later the government gave up on the idea of the perforated edges because it they were not that much good for separating the notes from the printed sheets. That resulted in the straight edge pieces, which are a bit more common.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567340[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1567341[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>The National Banknote Company printed the front of these notes, and the American Banknote Company printed the backs. It was supposed to prevent some printing clerk at one of the companies from stealing the notes.</p><p><br /></p><p>Counterfeits and the high prices the two banknote companies charged prompted the government to take the printing &quot;in house.&quot; The Second Series of five cent notes looked like this.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567344[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1567345[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>There continued to be counterfeiting issues which led to the third series of Fractional Currency. Here is the five cent note from that series.</p><p><br /></p><p>The man pictured on the front is Spencer Clark. He was an innovative government employee who came up with the wet printing process which revolutionized paper money production for the Union Government. He got into hot water for putting his portrait on a piece of currency. His boss, Francis Spinner, did the same thing, but he didn&#039;t get dinged for it.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567346[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1567347[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>Ultimately the government came to the conclusion that these small five cent notes did not fare that well in circulation. But how was the government going to replace and redeem them? They couldn&#039;t do it with silver coins because those pieces would not circulate. They would be hoarded and sometimes exported to Canada or the</p><p>Caribbean. The answer was the nickel five cent piece, which did not contain any silver.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1567348[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>And with that, I have told my little story and used up all ten pictures that we can put in one post. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie11" alt=":rolleyes:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /></p><p>.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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