$1 note, 1935

The note

The Series 1935A $1 Silver Certificate with a yellow Treasury seal (P#416AY; Friedberg 2306) is emergency paper for United States forces in North Africa and, later, in Sicily and in the first weeks in Italy. The ordinary blue-seal certificate of the same series is catalogued as P#416a. The HAWAII $1 is Hawaii P#36, Fr. 2300, serial S40499058C. This piece is Fr. 2306: a yellow circular Treasury seal and blue serials. The signatures are William Alexander Julian and Henry Morgenthau Jr. The black face on cream paper carries George Washington, the legend SILVER CERTIFICATE, a large 1 at left, and, at right, the yellow seal over WASHINGTON, D.C. Blue serials B 52497547 C repeat at lower left and upper right (B–C block). The printed series, SERIES 1935 A, sits beside the Secretary. Plate position A is read at upper left; the face-plate marking A4124 sits in the lower-right margin. The green back shows a central ONE, the unfinished pyramid and the Eye of Providence at left — ANNUIT COEPTIS, NOVUS ORDO SECLORUM, and MDCCLXXVI — and the eagle with E PLURIBUS UNUM at right. The motto IN GOD WE TRUST is absent: it came onto the $1 in later series. Back plate 2813 sits below the lettering, toward the right. Friedberg opens a mule on the 1934 ten-dollar note (Fr. 2308m) and does not open a mule number for Fr. 2306. The serial has a B prefix and a C suffix: a regular issue, with no replacement star. USPaperMoney.Info sets off the run B51624001C–B52624000C, 1,000,000 notes, inside the B–C block; a collector compilation on the Paper Money Forum identifies it as the second yellow-seal run in that block. B52497547C falls inside it. The photographs show folds, handling soil, and edge wear, with margins that appear complete. No numerical grade is assigned from the photographs: paper body, washing, and repairs cannot be read with certainty from the image. This collection piece, circulated and unslabbed, is documented by those photographs.

The North Africa yellow seal

Before Operation Torch the Treasury needed to pay troops in North Africa with a dollar that could be invalidated if a depot fell to the Axis, without touching the blue-seal certificate circulating at home. The mark is the yellow seal. The serials stay blue. There is no HAWAII overprint. Printed Series 1935A names the type: yellow-seal production began in 1942. That year’s B–C block carries three yellow-seal runs interrupted by blue-seal production. This piece belongs to the second, B51624001C–B52624000C.

The frame for those issues — Hawaii, the yellow seal, AMC, Bernhard — is on the World War II emergency-banknotes case, under Notaphily. This page is the documented Fr. 2306 example: serial B52497547C, not a type illustration.

Scarcity and printage

Fr. 2306 is the yellow-seal $1, Julian–Morgenthau signatures, a regular issue. Friedberg prints 26,916,000 notes. Collector literature divides that figure across the B–C block (about 3,000,000, in three runs), C–C (3,904,000), F–C (12,000), I–C (10,000,000), and R–C (10,000,000). F–C is the short block. B–C is not: this piece falls in the second run of that block, B51624001C–B52624000C. Paper Money for January–February 2019 (SPMC, vol. LVIII, no. 319) has been cited at 17,012,000 regular notes. This record keeps both figures and uses Friedberg’s, which matches the block sum. The serial has a B prefix and a C suffix. This record does not republish prices.

Population

A PMG or PCGS census for serial B52497547C has not been independently verified. The note is shown unslabbed.

Related pieces

Other records from the same issuer or era in this case.

• $1 · Silver Certificate · Series 1957 B
• $1 · HAWAII · Series 1935A
• $1 · Silver Certificate · Series 1928A
• $1 Tate–Mellon · Silver Certificate · 1928