The E-Sylum:  Volume 7, Number 40, October 3, 2004, Article 11

NEW U.S. FIFTY RELEASED

  This week the Houston Chronicle published an Associated Press
  story about the release of the new U.S. $50 bill.

  "A new $50 bill with touches of red, blue and yellow hit the
  streets today, and a new $10 bill is in the works. It would be
  the third greenback to get colorized to cut back on counterfeiting."

  "Government officials used one of the new $50s on Tuesday
   morning to buy a $45 U.S. flag, which came in a box, at a shop
  in Union Station. Old $50 bills will continue to be accepted and
  recirculated until they wear out.

  [OK, so who has that first $50 bill to be spent?   Was the
  serial number recorded and the transaction documented?  It
  would be a shame for that historic note to be lost to future
  generations of collectors. -Editor]

  As for plans for the new $10 bill, Alexander Hamilton, the
  nation's first treasury secretary, is expected to stay on the
  front, with the Treasury Department remaining on the back,
  Thomas Ferguson, director of the Bureau of Engraving and
  Printing, said in an interview."

  "The new $10 bill is expected to be unveiled this spring and
  put into circulation in fall 2005. That last time the note got a
  new look was in 2000, when Hamilton's portrait became
  oversized and moved slightly off center.

  "As with the $50 and the $20, there will be subtle background
  tones and tints. They will be different from those used on the
  other two so each of the notes will start to be even more
  distinctive and easier for people to differentiate quickly,"
  Ferguson said. He wouldn't say what the colors on the new
  $10 would be."

  "The colorizing project is part of a broader effort to make
  the bills harder to counterfeit, especially against the backdrop
  of readily available digital technology.

  "We've been working closely in cooperation ... with the
  manufacturers of ink jet printers, editing software, computer
  software in order to make it more difficult for people to be
  able to use that kind of technology to counterfeit," Ferguson
  said. As part of that effort, certain technology also has been
  incorporated in the new $20s, $50s and eventually the new
  $10s, he said.

  To read the full story, see: Full Story

  Wayne Homren, Editor

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