BANK NOTE REPORTS AND COUNTERFEIT DETECTORS

In this pamphlet is presented a bibliography of newspapers and periodicals known as “bank note reports and counterfeit detectors.” The year 1826 appears to have been the date when the first periodical o this type was published, and this record covers a period of about forty years to the end of the State bank note era soon after the close of the Civil War, or, more specifically, shortly after July 1, 1866 when a Federal tax of 10% became effective on State bank notes paid out by any bank. This prohibitive tax forced most of the State banks, then issuing bank notes, either to go into liquidation or convert into national banks and the primary need for these publications ceased. Several, however, found it worth while to continue after this date and, in addition to describing counterfeit notes, they furnished information now found in current bank directories. One of the more important publications of this type and one which probably enjoyed the largest circulation during the State bank note era has continued to this day and has appeared for many years as the American Banker, a daily banking newspaper.

The bank note reports and counterfeit detectors served a two-fold purpose, first, to show the rate of discount at which uncurrent bank notes would be purchased in the more important business centers of the country and secondly, to furnish a brief description of counterfeit, spurious and altered notes. Many of them contain financial and banking news of their period and some of them contain other news quite aptly described in several of the titles listed. The frequency of publication varied from daily to semiweekly, weekly, semimonthly and monthly and while many of them appeared in pamphlet form, several were published as a newspaper folio of varying sizes. One publisher in New York City and one in Philadelphia simultaneously published a weekly in folio form and a monthly in pamphlet form. Over a period of years, titles were changed from time to time, and the names which appear herein are the names under which they were more generally known.

One of these publications, a weekly in newspaper form, had a continuous existence as such for more than twenty-five years and, with the exception of a few scattering numbers in the first two years, a complete file was located. In another instance, a monthly in pamphlet form, a full twenty year file was found with the exception of only one issue. In a few other cases several relatively large files were found while in many cases only a very few scattering numbers were found to exist today. About twenty of the publications listed herein are known to the compiler merely by name. Owing to the fact that this subject has had little or no attention form writers in the past, it is likely that there were other publications of this type, that are not included in this bibliography.