I am doing a little research on a related topic, and I wonder if anyone knows the answers to a couple of questions I have regarding the 1935A silver Certificates with special markings R and S.
Letters R or S in red, were used as overprints on some US $1 Silver Certificates of Series 1935A to identify, it is said, printing on regular paper, marked R; and to test an alternative paper stock, marked S for Special paper. Is this the correct meaning of the letters R and S?
My understanding is that these notes were conceived in early 1944, and delivered on 20 June 1944. Is this correct, and is it recorded on what exact date the notes were conceived?
Also, is it known when the notes actually first entered circulation? I have not been able to find any reference to this.
Any insights would be most welcome. I have searched extensively on this, and the above is what I have learned about the note issues.
Your information is exactly what I have read. As I understand it, no conclusive results were reached from the experiment, at least as far as we know (Schwartz and Lindquist, US Small Size Paper Money).
Released on June 20th 1944 and issued into circulation to test their durability, 1935A $1 Silver Certificates with a bright red capital "R" (regular) and "S" (special) printed on the face, failed to deliver distinguishable results because of the lack of circulation. Rather than spending notes and keeping them circulating, John Q Citizen evidently decided to retain these notes as curios. A total of 2,368,000 notes were printed which is less than 1% of the total 1935A $1 SCs printed. You often see these sold as pairs. Be aware of the serial number ranges because unscrupulous sellers have been known to take regular 1935A $1 S-C block notes and stamp them with a red R or S.
Thanks for those! I will buy another pair sometime when I see them on offer at a reasonable price (postage from the US is real killer on ebay these days with all the sellers using Global Ship Prog).
My current interest is in the nature of the printing process of the R and S marks. Specifically if they were printed before or after the main printing process. They are referred to as overprints, but is it actually known if they are true overprints?
Jamie Yakes gave a talk on the R and S Experimentals in 2018 as part of the IPMS Lecture series in Kansas, MI. I saw the video of that in Nov 2020, but can't find it now (I did keep an offline copy though). That I cannot find the link doesn't mean that it isn't there anymore! Would anyone have a link to it by any chance?
This talk is the source of my background information on the R and S notes.
There are a few more of these videos from the shows that I came across when I was re-finding this one on the R and S Experimentals today, including one on Hawaii note issues including overprints for WW2. It is slightly off-topic, but gives good coverage of the WW2 era notes.
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I sure miss attending the Coin and Paper money Fairs in person. Might get things going again soon though!
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Posted 11/07/2021 4:25 pm
