4 Pence Commonwealth of Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania's 1777 fractional emission was a direct response to the chronic small-change shortage that plagued the Continental economy throughout the war years. Hard coin had largely vanished from circulation — hoarded, exported, or melted — and low-denomination paper filled the gap for everyday transactions that larger Continental bills couldn't serve.

John Dunlap, who printed this note in Philadelphia, is better known as the man who ran off the first copies of the Declaration of Independence the night of July 4–5, 1776. His press handled both history and the mundane arithmetic of wartime commerce.