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5 Dollars Bank of Montreal
| Issuer | Bank of Montreal |
|---|---|
| Year | 1923 |
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| Value | 5 Dollars (5 CAD) |
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| Obverse description | Black on olive-green underprint. At left, a portrait vignette of Sir Frederick Williams-Taylor (General Manager), and at right, a portrait vignette of Vincent Meredith (President), flank the central bank crest. Facsimile signatures of both officers appear beneath their respective portraits, with the place and date of issue inscribed along the lower margin. |
|---|---|
| Obverse lettering | The Bank of Montreal WILL PAY TO THE BEARER ON DEMAND MONTREAL, 2ND JANUARY 1923 Williams-Taylor - Meredith |
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| Comments |
The Bank of Montreal's 1923 Dominion-era chartered bank notes occupied an unusual legal position: they circulated as de facto currency despite being private liabilities, not government obligations. The federal government had been steadily legislating chartered banks out of the note-issuing business since 1934, but the 1923 series predates that pressure entirely — these were printed during the last decade when such issuance was still genuinely profitable.
Williams-Taylor and Meredith were both serving Bank of Montreal presidents whose tenures overlapped the signing window for this series. The dual-signature format was standard for the bank's notes of this period, with one signature from each of two senior officers as a control measure against fraudulent issuance.