Last Friday I closed on a house that I have had on the market for over two years, to celebrate I went downtown to the local coin shop. I hoped to get a $3 gold piece, I have never owned one, and want a nice BU example, of course he didn't have one. But he had just purchased from the executor of an estate of a banker from Grand Rapids Michigan, a collection of large sized notes ranging from the Legal Tender issues of 1862-1863 up to the last of the large sized gold certificates of 1922. The story on the banker's acquiring them is that he purchased them from over the counter receipts from the 1930's up into the 1970's. Yes, there were lots of common stuff like 1917 $1's, 2's etc, 1907 Woodchopper $5's, but the rare and unusual too.
To say the least, it was just one of those remarkably fortuitous times when I had the funds to invest in something, and it came along at the same time.
Some of the notes I acquired from this lot are webpaged here:
http://www.geocities.com/scottishmoney/banknotes/usa/usa2.htmlThen keep following the links on the bottom of the page.
A couple of the notes are quite possibly unique, the $50 National from Lancaster, OH dated 1909, and the 1875 Series $20 National from Bellefontaine, Ohio which is unreported in any grade. Several others like the 1880 Series $50 Legal Tender are quite scarce.