A rare and highly desirable “Black Back” Series of 1880 $50
Silver Certificate of Deposit, formerly from the Joel R. Anderson Collection,
is being featured in the Stack’s Bowers Galleries November 2020 United States
Currency auction in lot 7093.
The Fr.329 is graded About New 53 PPQ by PCGS Currency and is
the finest graded of the catalog number. Just 120,000 examples of this variety
were printed; today around 35 are known to survive. The portrait of Edward
Everett is at right. Engraved signatures of Treasury officials Rosecrans and
Nebeker are stacked to the bottom right of center. Blue printed serial numbers
appear in panels at bottom left and top right.
Edward Everett is best remembered as
an orator from Massachusetts, although he held a number of political offices.
It was Everett who, at the dedication of the Gettysburg National Battlefield in
1863, gave a two-hour speech before Lincoln made his Gettysburg Address, which
the president said would be little remembered. It became a classic, of course,
while what Everett had to say is unfamiliar except to the most dedicated
student of Civil War trivia.
These 1880 Silver Certificates of
Deposit get their “Black Back” nickname from the darkly printed open back designs
found on them. For this type “SILVER” is boldly portrayed in dark panels across
the center with “UNITED STATES” above and the denomination below. This note
last traded for $93,000 in our February 2018 offering of the Joel R. Anderson
Collection Part IV.
To view all the United States coins,
medals, tokens and paper money offered in the Stack’s Bowers Galleries November
2020 auction visit StacksBowers.com. For more information call 800-458-4646 or
email info@stacksbowers.com.
