1937 Canadian banknote series

none January 2023 The 1937 Canadian banknote series is the second series of banknotes of the Canadian dollar issued by the Bank of Canada. The banknotes were issued into circulation on 19 July 1937,Milwaukee Journal 1937 at which time the Bank of Canada began gradually removing banknotes from the 1935 series from circulation.Milwaukee Journal 1937 7 The $1000 banknote was issued several years later, as it was primarily used by chartered banks, which had a sufficient supply of the 1935 Series $1000 banknote.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 40 This was the first series of bilingual Canadian banknotes,Cross 1997 193 as the 1935 Series was a dual-language series with French banknotes issued in Quebec and English banknotes issued in the rest of Canada.Milwaukee Journal 1937 7 This series was created because of the introduction of the Bank of Canada Act, which required Canadian banknotes to be bilingual.Bank of Canada In this series, English was always on the left. The 1937 banknote series was followed by the 1954 Canadian Landscape series. With the exception of the $50 and $1000 notes, the colours introduced to the notes on this series remain to this day (or until they were no longer produced). Background In the House of Commons on 2 June 1936, Conservative member of parliament Thomas Langton Church protested against the requirement of bilingual banknotes in the Bank of Canada Act, stating there was no authority for it in the British North America Act, and that it had not been an issue during the 1935 federal election.The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1936 5 He favoured printing dual-language banknotes (distinct English and French banknotes) as had been done for the 1935 Series.The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1936 5 Other conservative members of the 18th Canadian Parliament, such as Robert Smeaton White, supported the Liberal Party of Canada majority government of William Lyon Mackenzie King to print bilingual banknotes.The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1936 5 The death of George V on 20 January 1936 was another factor for the Bank of Canada to introduce a new series of banknotes.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 37 It created designs for new banknotes incorporating the portrait of Edward VIII, but when he abdicated on 11 December 1936 in order to marry Wallis Simpson, the Bank of Canada rushed to prepare new designs.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 37 These used portraits of King George VI, who ascended the throne on 11 December 1936.Bank of Canada Banknotes The banknotes retain the "classical elements of the design" of the 1935 Series, and the reverse of most banknote denominations retain the allegorical themes and figures of the 1935 Series.Currency Museum The design of these banknotes has greater uniformity and consistency than the 1935 Series, with the obverse having a framed numeral in the top corners and the written value of each denomination framed in the lower corners, with English on the right and French on the left.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 The allegorical figures have the same frame in each denomination, unlike the 1935 Series, and are flanked by a large framed numeral representing the denomination's value.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 40 In 1938, the designs were modified to mitigate printing problems of the original design, increasing the width of the signature panel by 2.4 mm.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 43 All banknotes in the series measure 152.4 by 73.025 mm in 3. Denomination Face Image Back Image Colour Face Back Printed Issued $1 200px 200px Green King George VI Agriculture allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $2 200px 200px Terra cotta King George VI Harvest allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $5 200px 200px Blue King George VI Electric power allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $10 200px 200px Purple King George VI Transportation allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $20 200px 200px Olive green King George VI Fertility allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $50 200px 200px Orange King George VI Modern Inventions allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $100 200px 200px Sepia John A. Macdonald Commerce and industry allegory 2 January 1937 19 July 1937 $1000 200px 200px Rose pink Wilfrid Laurier Security allegory 2 January 1937 January 1952 Each denomination had a distinct colour, and this set of denomination colours would be used for all subsequent banknote series.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 The Bank of Canada modified the colours used from the 1935 Series in part to address the issue that some banknotes could not be easily distinguished in low light.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 This was particularly problematic for the $1 and $2 banknotes, which The St. Maurice Valley Chronicle of Trois-Rivières stated in an article that the green hue of the $1 banknote and the blue hue of the $2 banknote made the obverse appear similar, and that the more distinct colours of the reverse could be "confused in artificial light".The St. Maurice Valley Chronicle 1935 2 The Bank of Canada chose to design the $2 banknotes using a terracotta red called "sanguine" as its dominant colour, and also changed the colour of the $5 banknote to blue,The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 43 the $20 banknote to olive green, the $50 banknote to orange,The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 45 and the $100 banknote to the same tint of sepia used for the 1935 Series $500 banknote.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 46 Portraits The series only contained three portraits, which were centrally positioned on the obverse of the banknote on which they were included to accommodate the introduction of bilingual text.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 The portrait of George VI wearing an admiral's uniform appearing on six of the banknotes was based on a photograph taken by Bertram Park, for which an engraving was made by Robert Savage of ABN.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 26The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 34The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 37 It had been used on the $50 banknote of the 1935 Series.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 The two exceptions were the $100 banknote, which had the same portrait of John A. Macdonald as the 1935 Series $100 banknote, and the $1000 banknote, which had the same portrait of Wilfrid Laurier as the 1935 Series $100 banknote.Powell Establishment of a central bank 30The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 46 Allegories The allegorical figure on the $1 banknote was the same as that on the 1935 Series $1 banknote, depicting an agricultural theme.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 43 It was based on a painting by Alonzo Foringer of the American Bank Note Company (ABN).The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 31 The $2 banknote contains the same harvest allegory that appeared on the 1935 Series $10 banknote, and was engraved by Harry P. Dawson of the British American Bank Note Company (BABN, now BA International).The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 43 The $5 banknote has the same electric power generation allegory that appeared in the 1935 Series $5 banknote, and the $10 banknote has the same transportation allegory as the 1935 Series $2 banknote, represented by a winged figure of the Roman mythological character Mercury.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 44 The same fertility allegory that was on the 1935 Series $500 banknote, based on another painting by Foringer, was used on the $20 banknote of this series.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 45The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 28 The modern inventions allegorical figure on the $50 banknote, industry allegorical figure of the $100 banknote, and security allegorical figure of the $1000 banknote were the same as those used on the same denomination in the 1935 Series.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 45The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 46 Printing Engravings of the banknotes were created and subsequently transferred to steel rollers by rocking the rollers back and forth over the engraved die. After being hardened, the design was transferred to a master printing plate, which for the 1937 Series contained 24 copies of the engraved image. This process is known as siderography.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 42 The original plates, dies, and rolls for this series were destroyed by the Canadian Bank Note Company (CBN) after the modified version of the series was created in 1938.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 42 The Canadian Bank Note Company printed the $1, $20, $50, $100, and $1000 banknotes, and the British American Bank Note Company printed the $2, $5, and $10 banknotes.Cuhaj 2010 189 The printing companies are identified as CBNC (Canadian Bank Note Company) and BABNC (British American Bank Note Company) in the source document. Legacy Ultimately, the "production of bilingual notes was widely endorsed by parliamentarians and by the public".The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 37 Because the colour of the $5 banknote was changed to blue, the Bank of Canada "recalled and cancelled 3,644,000" of the 1935 series blue $2 banknotes to avoid confusion.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 38 The $2 banknotes were rarely used in the prairie provinces of Canada as that denomination had "never been popular" thereSwanson 1949 1 since its use in the 1920s as the standard price for a prostitute along the "notorious River Street hotel strip" in Moose Jaw, earning it the nickname Moose Jaw money.Toronto Star 1990 A26 This denomination would be shunned by many in the prairie provinces until the 1990s, when $2 banknotes of the Birds of Canada series became increasingly accepted.Toronto Star 1990 A26 By 1940, 495,946,232 CAD worth of banknotes were in circulation, of which 379 million CAD was held by the public and the remainder by chartered banks.The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1942 17 This reflected an increase of 95 million CAD in 1940 and 109 million CAD in 1941.The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1942 17 Most denominations had a static circulation pattern, with increasing scarcity for successively larger denominations. The $2 banknote, however, had no discernable pattern of use, fluctuating from abundance to scarcity.Swanson 1949 1 In January and February 1949, for example, Montreal and Toronto experienced large spikes (also referred to as "jags") in the use of $2 banknotes for financial transactions, and as the spike subsided over two weeks, another one appeared in Ottawa.Swanson 1949 1 The Bank of Canada made an official statement about the phenomenon, for which it could provide no explanation, stating that the $2 banknotes "come like migratory birds and disappear like the lemmings".Swanson 1949 1 A memorandum written by Donald Gordon, Deputy Governor of the Bank of Canada, stated a preference to produce a new series of banknotes every five years to "obstruct any attempt at wholesale counterfeiting", but the plan was abandoned because of World War II.The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 47 Notes 2 References Canada Money Numismatics The Charlton Standard Catalogue of Canadian Government Paper Money 10th Cross W.K. The Charlton Press Toronto 1997 0889681902 registration https://archive.org/details/charltonstandard0000unse_y6i0 Standard Catalog Of World Paper Money General Issues 1368-1960 Cuhaj George S. Krause Publications 2010 9781440216350 1538-2001 A History of the Canadian dollar Powell James Bank of Canada 0662281233 Two-dollar notes bust out all over Swanson Frank 106 188 The Ottawa Evening Citizen 5 February 1949 https://www.bankofcanada.ca/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/promo_art.pdf The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes Bank of Canada 6 December 2006 13 March 2014 0660632462 The Art and Design of Canadian Bank Notes 2006 http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/eppp-archive/100/201/301/bank_can_review/2006/spring/cover/en/banknotes/general/character/1937.html 1937 Series Bank Note Series, 1935 to present Bank of Canada, archived at Collections Canada 12 March 2014 Bank of Canada http://www.currencymuseum.ca/national-currency-collection/past-series-bank-canada-notes/1937-series-the-first-bilingual-series/ https://web.archive.org/web/20131001225744/http://www.currencymuseum.ca/national-currency-collection/past-series-bank-canada-notes/1937-series-the-first-bilingual-series/ dead October 1, 2013 1937 Series, the first bilingual series Currency Museum, Bank of Canada Currency Museum Bilingual bank notes the latest in Canada Milwaukee Journal 19 July 1937 Milwaukee Journal 1937 Tense scene as McGeer makes attack on govt. 93 299 The Ottawa Evening Citizen 3 June 1936 The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1936 Large increase in circulation of bank notes 99 205 The Ottawa Evening Citizen 14 February 1942 The Ottawa Evening Citizen 1942 The new bank notes The St. Maurice Valley Chronicle 18 April 1935 The St. Maurice Valley Chronicle 1935 $2 bill bucks history for Prairie comeback The Canadian Press Toronto Star 4 January 1990 Toronto Star 1990 Category:1937 in Canada Category:Currencies introduced in 1937 Category:Banknotes of Canada