When it comes to American Dollar bills, 'innovation-in-design' is the word to capture its historicity. The crisp George Washington bills, as we use today is not the only legitimate American money that's existed. The paper currency, dating back to the colonial times, had a variety of symbols ranging from pyramids, eagles, goddesses, frogs and even Santa Claus on it. Did any of us even realize this quirky side of money ever?
To capture the symbolism behind all these dollar bills would surely be exhaustive and practically not possible. But we bring for you the interesting tale of how the Santa Claus landed up being the "face" of money in the American past. Here's a bit of interesting quick-sweep history.
Since the 17th century, the colonists have used a variety of things as currency; keeping the European coins and bills for official transactions only. However, as the tiffs between the mother country and the colony increased, minting one's own money was one of the first symbols of dissent. Following the Gold Rush, when most people built their coffers, the colonial banks too started issuing their own paper currency, that was in most cases backed by land as the collateral. In fact by 1860s, it is believed that there were 8,000 bank in the colonies, who floated their own variations of money.
This era, what most modern economists would call a BANK HOLIDAY, is popularly known as the "Free Banking Era" wherein the most featured man was none other than the SANTA! It wasn't an aberration certainly but a legitimate piece of money that was used to buy and sell commodities.
The quaint and still shrouded in mystery, St. Nick's popular avatar as Santa Claus was mostly found on one-dollar, three-dollar, five-dollar and twenty-dollar denominations issued by Howard Company Bank in Boston as well as banks in Massachusetts often. Makes one say "HO HO HO", right!
To put an end to the confusion while not completing ignoring the symbolic value of such currency, the US government adopted a standard design - portraits on the front and monuments on the back, in 1929.
Coming back to modern times, people still have a fetish for such notes. Sadly, it has no economic value and is a novelty bill that you can stick in your scrapbooks nicely. Interestingly, Marketing Productions, a Florida-based fundraising organisation capitalized on the idea of auctioning such "Santa Dollars" since the mid-80s. They have official patent rights to mint Santa's image on American dollar bills that they sell to other organisation for some real hardcore cash. Besides this, they also print Easter Bunny and Cupid bills to celebrate the spirit of Easter and Valentine's Day, in an out-of-box way.
So if you are a collector or simply someone who wants to gift a 'different' keepsake to your friends and family, here's an interesting option folks. The next time you see that dollar bill, most of you will surely slip into a pensive mode because your money is symbolic of a lot many things you just didn't realize till now.
Do tell us if you found this snippet interesting by leaving a comment below.
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Happy Holiday Season!
The quaint and still shrouded in mystery, St. Nick's popular avatar as Santa Claus was mostly found on one-dollar, three-dollar, five-dollar and twenty-dollar denominations issued by Howard Company Bank in Boston as well as banks in Massachusetts often. Makes one say "HO HO HO", right!
To put an end to the confusion while not completing ignoring the symbolic value of such currency, the US government adopted a standard design - portraits on the front and monuments on the back, in 1929.
Coming back to modern times, people still have a fetish for such notes. Sadly, it has no economic value and is a novelty bill that you can stick in your scrapbooks nicely. Interestingly, Marketing Productions, a Florida-based fundraising organisation capitalized on the idea of auctioning such "Santa Dollars" since the mid-80s. They have official patent rights to mint Santa's image on American dollar bills that they sell to other organisation for some real hardcore cash. Besides this, they also print Easter Bunny and Cupid bills to celebrate the spirit of Easter and Valentine's Day, in an out-of-box way.
So if you are a collector or simply someone who wants to gift a 'different' keepsake to your friends and family, here's an interesting option folks. The next time you see that dollar bill, most of you will surely slip into a pensive mode because your money is symbolic of a lot many things you just didn't realize till now.
Do tell us if you found this snippet interesting by leaving a comment below.
Remember to follow us on Twitter or our Facebook Page. You can also subscribe to our RSS feeds for more such updates by the E-junkie.info team.
Happy Holiday Season!
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