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2 Dollars Franklin Bank
| Issuer | Franklin Bank, Boston |
|---|---|
| Year | 1831 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | 2 Dollars (2 USD) |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Typeset and engraved note printed in brown-black ink on plain paper, with an ornate border composed of repeated microtext reading "Two Dollars" running along all four sides of the outer frame. The central field is headed by a bold letterpress panel bearing "FRANKLIN BANK", flanked at left and right by numeral "2" counters, below which a copperplate-script promise-to-pay text occupies the main body of the note, culminating in a bold "TWO DOLLARS" panel. The lower portion carries the place of issue "BOSTON", a manuscript date, and two manuscript signatures, above a further "FRANKLIN BANK" microtext rule. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | FRANKLIN BANK The President Directors & Company of the FRANKLIN BANK promise to pay JM P or bearer on demand TWO DOLLARS BOSTON FRANKLIN BANK Two Dollars Two Dollars |
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| Comments |
The Franklin Bank of Boston was chartered in 1825 and operated during a period when Massachusetts bank charters were relatively easy to obtain and correspondingly easy to abuse. By the early 1830s, the Boston banking scene was crowded with institutions of wildly varying soundness, and the Franklin Bank itself was not among the most robust — it failed in 1833, just two years after this note's issue date, leaving holders scrambling during a period when specie redemption was already contentious across New England.
J. Drake was an active Boston-area engraver and plate maker working in the ornamental bank note trade before the major security printers consolidated the industry later in the decade.