United States · Silver Certificate · Educational Series

$5 note, 1896

$5 · Silver Certificate · Series 1896

Face with Electricity presenting light to the world, a red Treasury seal, and blue serials 31528195; green back with Ulysses S. Grant and Philip H. Sheridan. Series of 1896, Fr. 270, plate C, Lyons–Roberts signatures.

Catalog facts

Pick reference: P#337(3) · Fr. 270
Serial number: 31528195
Signatures: Judson W. Lyons (Register of the Treasury) and Ellis H. Roberts (Treasurer of the United States)
Condition: Historical certification: Very Fine 30 EPQ (PMG) in Archives International lot 1160, 22 October 2013. Now in a sleeve, unslabbed; no certificate number is on the piece (private collection)
Printage: Series of 1896, printed as SERIES OF 1896. Bureau of Engraving and Printing, Washington, D.C. Plate letter C, the letter recorded on the 2013 lot. Large-size note. That is not a measurement of this sleeved piece. The printed signatures are Lyons–Roberts, which Friedberg numbers Fr. 270 and Pick numbers P#337(3). The other regular pairings are Fr. 268 (Tillman–Morgan) and Fr. 269 (Bruce–Roberts). Official printage: not verified. No BEP ledger here fixes how many Fr. 270 notes were printed or the official serial limits. A documented-survivor span — not a print run — cites at least serial 28,111,181 (Heritage, 2022, then the lowest Fr. 270 in Track & Price) and 34,791,855 (Stack’s Bowers, 2025). This record did not reopen those lot pages. Counter 31,528,195 falls inside that cited span. The serial is ordinary: it is not low (1–100) and it is not fancy. This record does not invent a BEP printage for that serial.

Face of the Series of 1896 $5 Silver Certificate, serial 31528195: Electricity, the red Treasury seal, and Lyons–Roberts signatures, in a sleeve.

Back of the Educational Series $5, Fr. 270: Ulysses S. Grant and Philip H. Sheridan in the green engraving, in a sleeve.

The note

The Series of 1896 $5 Silver Certificate (Pick 337(3), Friedberg 270; Numista N#332092) is the high denomination of the Educational Series, large-size Treasury paper, not a Treasury Note and not the 1899 “Chief” $5. The black face carries the allegory Electricity Presenting Light to the World: winged Electricity raises a lamp; at left, Jupiter in a chariot; Fame sounds a trumpet over a map of the United States; at right, Peace. The Capitol dome sits in the distance. Walter Shirlaw composed that vignette and George F. C. Smillie engraved the face. The arc certifies a Treasury deposit, payable to the bearer on demand in FIVE SILVER DOLLARS. The imprint cites the ACT OF AUGUST 4, 1886. The small red Treasury seal sits at right. Blue serials 31528195 repeat at upper right and lower left. Plate letter C is the letter the 2013 lot records; it is not securely readable on these photographs. The signatures are Judson W. Lyons, Register of the Treasury, and Ellis H. Roberts, Treasurer of the United States: that pairing is Fr. 270 (P#337(3)). Fr. 268 is Tillman–Morgan and Fr. 269 is Bruce–Roberts. The green back shows Ulysses S. Grant at left and Philip H. Sheridan at right, with a winged head above a large V. Thomas F. Morris and Lorenzo J. Hatch worked on that back; the principal engraving is credited to Smillie. This piece is shown now in a sleeve, unslabbed. In Archives International Auctions, Part XVI, lot 1160, 22 October 2013, the same serial, plate C, Lyons–Roberts, was listed as PMG Very Fine 30 EPQ. That certification is historical: no certificate number is on the sleeve, and a current holder is not confirmed. The lot sold for $3,750. The public line does not itemize a buyer’s premium. It is not the Educational Series $1, Fr. 224, serial B3207078, nor the $2, Fr. 247, serial 1712091. Redemption of these certificates in silver ended in 1968; they remain legal tender at face value.

The Educational Series

In 1896 the Treasury placed three large-size silver certificates — one, two, and five dollars — into circulation. Collectors call them the Educational Series. The five-dollar note shows Electricity presenting light to the world. They are not the Treasury Notes or Coin Notes of 1890–1891, and they are not the 1899 $5 with Running Antelope. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing printed them in Washington. In 1929 the format was cut by about 30 percent: this piece sits on the large-size side of that line.

Scarcity and printage

Fr. 270 (P#337(3)) is the Lyons–Roberts combination, the last of the three regular pairings; Fr. 268 is Tillman–Morgan and Fr. 269 is Bruce–Roberts. Among those three, Fr. 270 is the scarcest in the cited censuses, but an ordinary circulated example is scarce rather than exceptionally rare. High grade is a different case: Fr. 270 has been described as the hardest of the three varieties in high grade. At the start of 2026 a cited reading of the PMG census — not re-counted here — placed about 5 percent of certified Fr. 270 notes at Choice Uncirculated 63 or higher. A 2014 Track & Price census cited by Heritage, and not re-audited here, counted 394 Fr. 270 survivors, against 663 Fr. 269 and 1,049 Fr. 268. Serial 31528195 is not low, not fancy, not a replacement, and not a major error recorded here. Its interest is that of an Fr. 270 with an auction provenance.

Population

Official printage: not verified. A cited PMG census, not reopened on this page, counts 408 Fr. 270 notes, against 638 Fr. 269 and 1,002 Fr. 268. That is a grading-service population, not what was printed. A July 2012 PMG article counted 125 Fr. 270, 211 Fr. 269, and 350 Fr. 268; the census has grown since. For this serial, the PMG Very Fine 30 EPQ grade is the one on the 22 October 2013 lot. The note is now in a sleeve, with no certificate number.