US Coins

Heritage sells book of James Smillie's engravings for $64,625

A leather-bound book titled Specimens of Bank Note Engraving by Toppan, Carpenter, Casilear & Co., sold for $64,625 during the Sept. 3 Heritage Currency Signature auction in Long Beach, Calif. This page of uncut sheets of obsolete note proofs is part of the 75-page book from the James Smillie Archive.

Image courtesy of Heritage Auctions.

A leather-bound book titled Specimens of Bank Note Engraving by Toppan, Carpenter, Casilear & Co., sold for $64,625 during the Sept. 3 Heritage Currency Signature auction in Long Beach, Calif.

The 75-page book was from the James Smillie Archive and featured seven uncut sheets of obsolete note proofs and two pages of world note proofs. Smillie and several members of the Smillie family were bank note engravers in the 18th and 19th centuries and did extensive work for the National Bank Note Co.

One of the sheets displays $20, $50 and $100 obsolete note designs for the Bank of Caledonia in Danville, Vt. According to the catalog, “these were previously unknown as proofs, as a sheet, with this date, and with this imprint.”

Also on the same page is a proof of a £5 note for The Wakefield and Barnsley Union Bank, circa 1830s to 1840s.

Other rare and previously unknown obsolete note proofs are featured on the other pages.

For more information about this lot or others, visit the Heritage website.

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