WILLIAM WELLS BROWN, WILDCAT BANKER?

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V24 2021 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 24, Number 48, November 28, 2021, Article 19

An article by Ross Bullen in the Public Domain Review chronicles the life of William Wells Brown and his experience issuing scrip notes in the wildcat banking era. -Editor

On January 1, 1834, a young man named William escaped from slavery near Cincinnati, Ohio. Travelling at night through the frigid winter, without an overcoat to keep him warm, William suffered from cold and hunger, and yet, as he recorded in the first of many autobiographical narratives, his thoughts were constantly drifting toward the future. My escape to a land of freedom now appeared certain, he wrote, and the prospects of the future occupied a great part of my thoughts. What should be my occupation, was a subject of much anxiety to me; and the next thing what should be my name? Although his mother had called him William, he had, for most of his life, been known as Sandford to the series of men who had legally owned him. But now he would be William.

Brown would become a popular and prolific anti-slavery lecturer and a vocal supporter of social reform. While never working exclusively as a writer, he achieved success across multiple literary modes. With the debut of The Escape; or A Leap to Freedom (1858), Brown became the first published African American playwright, while his The Negro in the American Rebellion (1867) is considered the first military history of African Americans. He wrote the earliest African American travelogue and, later in his life, was a practicing physician.

As Brown tells it, in the fall of 1835, he found himself broke in Monroe, Michigan, having been cheated out of his summer's earnings by a dishonest steamship captain. Brown sought employment with the local barber and, after being repeatedly turned down, he embraced the spirit of the free market and opened his own shop directly across the street from his competition. According to Brown, one of the barber's customers offered him a room in which to commence business. . . on the opposite side of the street as well as his influence with the townspeople. Brown eagerly accepted and, in order to attract new business, made an impressive sign for the barbershop, advertising himself as the Fashionable Hair-dresser from New York, Emperor of the West.5 Although the Emperor had never actually been to New York, his marketing strategy was a great success. He reports that in a few weeks I had the entire business of the town, to the great discomfiture of the other barber. Flush with profit, Brown took the advice of a friend and printed and distributed shinplasters: promissory notes for small amounts of money — spare change, essentially — that he could give to his customers, and which would then circulate alongside other kinds of money in Monroe. Brown offers his readers a detailed explanation of this unusual economic situation:

At this time, money matters in the Western States were in a sad condition. Any person who could raise a small amount of money was permitted to establish a bank, and allowed to issue notes for four times the sum raised. This being the case, many persons borrowed money merely long enough to exhibit to the bank inspectors, and the borrowed money was returned, and the bank left without a dollar in its vaults, if indeed it had a vault about its premises. The result was that banks were started all over the Western States, and the country flooded with worthless paper. These were known as the ‘Wild Cat Banks.' Silver coin being very scarce, and the [state-chartered] banks not being allowed to issue notes for a smaller amount than one dollar, several persons put out notes of from 6 to 75 cents in value; these were called ‘Shinplasters.' The Shinplaster was in the shape of a promissory note, made payable on demand. I have often seen persons with large rolls of these bills, the whole not amounting to more than five dollars.

As Brown explains it, the lack of small change in Monroe — a nationwide scarcity in this period — created a demand for shinplasters: small denomination bills issued by private businesses serving as Wildcat banks (like Brown's barber shop) and backed by nothing more than the confidence of the local community. In Bank Notes and Shinplasters: The Rage for Paper Money in the Early Republic, Joshua R. Greenberg recounts how during the 1830s these western banks were often labelled as fraudulent, wild cat organizations, the joke being that such banks — in order to discourage anyone from trying to redeem their notes — were located in areas so remote that only wildcats lived nearby.

Although people in Monroe may have been skeptical of Brown's shinplasters, their desperation for small denomination bills ultimately outweighed any suspicions about Brown. At first my notes did not take well; they were too new, and viewed with a suspicious eye, he writes, But through the assistance of my customers, and a good deal of exertion on my own part, my bills were soon in circulation; and nearly all the money received in return for my notes was spent in fitting up and decorating my shop. By giving his customers shinplaster promissory notes as change, Brown was able to keep more of their money, and to use this surplus to fix up his business. What Brown did not anticipate, however, is what would happen if his customers decided to redeem the shinplasters en masse, demanding payment. He was about to find out.

The complete article is well worth reading for additional color on the wildcat banking era. But the story recounted by Mr. Brown may or may not be true - versions of it appeared in many of his writings over the years. I checked my copy of Haxby and see no such notes from Monroe, MI. Do shinplasters for William Wells Brown's establishment exist? -Editor

To read the complete article, see:
William Wells Brown, Wildcat Banker (https://publicdomainreview.org/essay/william-wells-brown-wildcat-banker)