The E-Sylum:  Volume 10, Number 24, June 17, 2007, Article 28

ARTIST RECREATES HAWAIIAN BANK NOTES

A reader writes: "I guess you saw this story about the man who
'recreates' Hawaiian paper money? What recreation does the money
partake in (or off)? And don't you just love the word 'numismatologist'?"

[Actually, I hadn't seen this one.  Here are some excerpts. -Editor]

"Quoth Voltaire, 'Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic
value -- zero.' Ouch! Which might explain why so few bills remain from
the Hawaiian Kingdom. During an amnesty period around the turn of the
century, local banks swapped fresh American paper money for the
rapidly devaluing Hawaiian Kingdom notes. Overnight, Kalakaua's
experiment in creating a Hawaiian paper-money system evaporated.

"But one Honolulu man is making sure we don't forget. Dennis Fitzgerald,
a Realtor who dabbles in art, has spent the last decade restoring the
details of the kingdom's paper money, pixel-by-pixel on a computer,
and researching the background of the now-vanished currency ...

"Wait a minute. There was Hawaiian money?

"'It started about 1879,' explained local numismatologist Don Medcalf
of Hawaiian Island Stamp and Coin. 'The American Bank Note Company out
of New York -- who designed everyone's money at the time -- was pretty
rushed to create it. They picked some scenes from South American
currency to put on the Hawaiian money. The only bill to actually have
a vignette of Kalakaua was the $500 bill, and only 200 of those were
printed.'

Most have disappeared. 'There are only five known copies of the $100
bills and they're all in terrible condition,' Medcalf said. 'A $10
bank note from the estate of Samuel Mills Damon was auctioned last
year for $268,000.'

"Fitzgerald's reprints take it a step further. Not only has he lovingly
restored the engraved detail when possible, he's colorized the notes
as if they had been printed in a full range of hues. The result is
rather attractively Victorian and, as Fitzgerald is the first to admit,
turns the notes into artwork rather than collectibles.

"'Like many people, I had no idea that such bills existed,' said
Fitzgerald. 'The library had some pictures of the original notes,
but from the time the bills vanished in 1910, to the invention of
the Internet, no one had really seen them. I started with the highest-
quality photographs I could find, and from there started restoring
the engraving details using PhotoShop under high magnifications.'

"The original bills were printed with black and green or brown ink.
Pretty dull. 'An artist friend commented on how pretty they would
be if colored, so I added tints that weren't garish or neon, very
period in appearance.'  Fitzgerald reproduces the bills as artwork,
mounted in archival frames with period postcards or maps, with
provenance sheets attached to the back."

To read the complete article, see: Full Story

His Majesty - the King of the Hawaiian Islands vignette
King of the Hawaiian Islands vignette

To view other ABNCO vignettes from Hawaiian bank notes, see:
ABNCO vignettes

  Wayne Homren, Editor

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