50 Dollars Federal Reserve Bank Note, Brown Seal

The Federal Reserve Bank Notes of 1929 were a deliberate policy instrument, not a routine printing run. When the Federal Reserve Act was amended that year, the old large-size format was retired and all U.S. currency was reduced to a uniform smaller size — the dimensions now familiar. FRBNs were technically obligations of the individual issuing Federal Reserve Bank rather than the United States government, a legal distinction that separated them from Federal Reserve Notes proper and gave each note a specific bank's name and charter number.

The brown seal distinguishes this series from the green-sealed Federal Reserve Notes issued simultaneously. Twelve banks issued the 1929 FRBN series; the rarer district issues — Minneapolis, Dallas, Kansas City — command serious premiums over their New York or Chicago counterparts at equivalent grades.