NEW BOOK: NOTABLE NOTES

Hardback letter size book, 382 pages, profusely illustrated in color. Foreword by Wendell Wolka. © 2010, reprinted 2020.

Seventy-two short stories and their historical background told by a collection of large size US currency. The complex history of the beginnings of today's bank notes simply laid out.

TWENTY-ONE CHAPTERS

• Why do we collect
• Brief history of paper money
• Large size currency types
• Demand Notes
• Legal Tender Notes (3 chapters)
• Interest Bearing Issues
• History of silver and finance
• Silver Certificates (3 chapters)
• Gold Certificates
• Coin or Treasury Notes
• Federal Reserve Notes
• Federal Reserve Bank Notes
• National Bank Notes, 4 chapters
• 47-page glossary and index

For more information, or to order, see (click on "Academic Books"):
Notable notes: a history of United States currency, by Peter Jones (http://www.artsandacademic.net/e-publications.php)

First impressions are always interesting and often memorable. I first met Peter at one of the American Numismatic Association's Summer Seminars which are held annually in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He was a student in a course I was teaching that year, "An Introduction to Paper Money." It's one of those survey courses that gives students a flavor of many different aspects of paper money but cannot get into a lot of detail on any one of them because of time limitations. This is usually perfect for new collectors who are just trying to understand what might be out there that would be of interest to them.

Peter admitted that he was primarily a coin collector (I have long since forgiven him for that.) When you teach these classes you always worry that the students just might sit there for the week, never utter a question or an opinion, and leave it to you to do all of the talking. Peter quickly relieved me of that concern. He was always curious WHY certain things happened the way they did. And they were always GOOD questions--ones that kept the instructor's brain racing to come up with an answer sometimes. I remember answering one of Peter's inquiries with an exasperated "Peter, they did it that way because they could!"

This book makes me feel quite proud. I can now actually point to one of my former students and fellow numismatists as a definite convert from collecting those "little round metallic discs that go 'clunk' when dropped on their heads" to paper money! And it is clear that Peter enjoys the subject and has used his curiosity and intellect to weave together a wonderful set of stories, history lessons, and little known facts based on seventy-two "notable notes" which he has selected.

This well illustrated book is an easy read which will leave you knowing more than before you read it whether you are brand new to paper money or a veteran "rag picker." And that, after all, is what numismatics is all about: sharing information with others so that we can collectively build the foundation of knowledge for both present and future generations of collectors.

Well done, Peter, well done!

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web