Continental Currency, Eight Dollars
DateMay 10, 1775.
Artist/Maker
Hall & Sellers
MediumPaper & ink
DimensionsOW: 2 3/4" OH: 2 1/2"
Credit LineGift of the Lasser family
Object number1994-210,17
DescriptionContinental currency. "The United Colonies EIGHT DOLLARS. SEVEN DOLLARS. THIS Bill entitles the Bearer to receive EIGHT SPANISH Milled DOLLARS, or the Value thereof in GOLD or SILVER, according to the resolutions of the CONGRESS, held at Philadelphia, the 10th of May, 1775. VIII DOLLARS."Label TextTrained as a printer, Benjamin Franklin got his first commission to print paper money in 1731. By 1739, the notes he was producing for the colony of Pennsylvania were double sided, and they included a naturalistic representation of a different leaf on the reverse of each denomination. Produced by a complicated secret process, Franklin's "nature prints" were used as an attractive anti- counterfeiting device on the backs of a number of different colonies' notes, and those of the Continental Congress, until around 1780.
MarkingsSignatures: "Jas Milligan, James Read" Serial No. "47589"
Exhibition(s)
May 10, 1775.
May 10, 1775.
May 10, 1775.
May 10, 1775.
May 10, 1775
May 10, 1775.
May 10, 1775.
November 2, 1776
November 2, 1776
July 22, 1776
July 22, 1776
May 20, 1777