I can't decide if I like it more for its depiction of Pocahontas (Is it true that Mel Gibson wouldn't come out of his trailer during the voice over work on Disney's version until they re-designed Miss P into something he could find attractive?) or for the ability of my Sony Mavica to shoot macro with such detail. Click to see the larger image.You may notice that the stamp is clearly stuck to something. That is what is left of a shredded fractional note. There were 2 in this envelope and fortunately the other one looked like this:
A little folded but not bad. I have determined that this front/back represent the first issue of paper coins.This next piece I need help with:
This is connected somehow with either the envelope or Paterson, N.J. I can't find any address records to verify where this piece originates from. It feels and looks like parchment and the fact that it refers to shillings yet has a New York address makes me wonder if it isn't really old. Looks like there's going to be a Part 3 to this post. Big things really do come in small packages. Here is another tease for part 3:
Re shillings as U.S. currency:
ReplyDeleteDue to ongoing shortages of US coins in some regions, shillings continued to circulate well into the 19th century, for example being mentioned as the standard monetary unit throughout the autobiography of Solomon Northup.
I also tracked down this reference to shillings issued by the Patterson Iron Works:
http://numismatics.org/collection/1945.42.305
There's no photo at the link, but it must be the same one you have. Presumably your item served as a type of private currency during times of monetary crisis.
Stan