Banknotes of the Canadian dollar

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Face sides of the 2001 Canadian Journey series depicting, top to bottom, Wilfrid Laurier, John A. Macdonald, Queen Elizabeth II, William Lyon Mackenzie King, and Robert Borden. Beginning in 2011, they are being replaced by polymer banknotes of the Frontier series.

The last polymer banknote will be distributed by late 2013. As of May 26, the $100 and $50 notes have been distributed to the public.

Canadian banknotes are the banknotes of Canada, denominated in Canadian dollars (CAD). In everyday usage, they are called bills. Currently, they are issued in five, ten, twenty, fifty, and hundred dollar denominations. All current notes are issued by the Bank of Canada, which released its first series of notes in 1935. Banknotes issued in Canada can be viewed at the Currency Museum of the Bank of Canada in Ottawa.

History

The first paper money issued in Canada denominated in dollars were British Army Bills, issued between 1813 and 1815 in denominations between $1 and $400. These were emergency issues due to the War of 1812. The first banknotes were issued in 1817 by the Montreal Bank.

Chartered Banks

$1 Banknote of the Colonial Bank of Canada issued in 1859.

Large numbers of chartered banks were founded in the 1830s, 1850s, 1860s and 1870s, although many issued paper money for only a short time. Others, including the Montreal Bank (later called the Bank of Montreal), issued notes for several decades. Until 1858, many notes were issued denominated in both shillings/pounds and dollars (5 shillings = $1). A large number of different denominations were issued, including $1, $2, $3, $4, $5, $10, $20, $25, $40, $50, $100, $500 and $1000. After 1858, only dollar denominations were used. The Bank Act of 1871 limited the smallest denomination the chartered banks could issue to $4, increased to $5 in 1880. To facilitate purchases below $5 without using Dominion notes, some charted banks issued notes in unusual denominations, such as the $6 and $7 notes issued by the Molsons Bank in 1871.

Colonial Governments

$1 Dominion of Newfoundland note issued in 1920.

Prior to Canadian confederation, dollar denominated banknotes were issued by the governments of British Columbia, Canada, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island. Of these, the Province of Canada, established in 1841, was the most prolific issuer of paper money. Notes were produced for the government by the Bank of Montreal between 1842 and 1862, in denominations of $4, $5, $10, $20, $50 and $100. In 1866, the Province of Canada began issuing its own paper money, in denominations of $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50, $100 and $500. The Dominion of Newfoundland issued notes denominated in Newfoundland dollars from 1901 until it joined confederation in 1949.

Government of Canada

25 cent Dominion of Canada note issued in 1900.

For a temporary period following confederation in 1867, Province of Canada notes served as the Dominion of Canada's first national currency, and notes were dispatched from Ontario and Quebec to the other provinces. In 1870, the first Dominion of Canada notes were issued in denominations of 25¢, $1, $2, $500 and $1000. $50 and $100 notes followed in 1872. The bulk of later government note production was of $1 and $2 notes, with a $4 denomination added in 1882. $5 notes were issued starting in 1912. The last 25¢ notes, known as shinplasters due to their small size, were dated 1923. Issuance of all Dominion notes ceased in 1935, after the establishment of the Bank of Canada.

Other public issuers

$2 Bank of Canada note issued in 1986.

Some municipalities also issued dollar-denominated notes. This was most prevalent in the 1930s, when depression scrip was issued in an attempt to alleviate the effects of the Great Depression on local citizens. The province of Alberta also launched its own scheme in 1936 by issuing prosperity certificates.

Bank of Canada

In 1934, with only ten chartered banks still issuing notes, the Bank of Canada was founded and began issuing notes in denominations of $1, $2, $5, $10, $20, $25, $50, $100, $500 and $1000. In 1944, the chartered banks were prohibited from issuing their own currency, with the Royal Bank of Canada and the Bank of Montreal among the last to issue notes. From that point forward, the Bank of Canada has been the sole issuer of bank notes denominated in Canadian dollars. A liability of more than $12 million remains on the Bank of Canada's books up to the present day, representing the face value of Dominion of Canada, provincial, and chartered bank notes still outstanding.^[1]

Production

Notes are issued by the Bank of Canada, but the actual production of the banknotes is outsourced to the Canadian Bank Note Company and BA International Inc (part of Giesecke & Devrient of Germany) in accordance with the specifications and requirements of the Bank of Canada. All wording on the notes appears in both of Canada's official languages, English and French. Bank notes are printed on paper composed of pure cotton. In March 2010 the government of Canada announced that beginning in 2011, cotton fibre will be discontinued and replaced by a synthetic polymer.^[2]

Counterfeiting

Efforts to reduce counterfeiting in recent years have sharply reduced the number of counterfeit notes in circulation. The number of counterfeit notes passed annually in Canada peaked in 2004, when 553,000 counterfeit notes were passed. Counterfeiting has decreased annually since that peak, with only 53,536 notes passed in 2010.^[3] The new polymer notes will be made of plastic, making it harder to counterfeit. There are 2 clear windows on the new notes, one smaller than the other. The smaller one is shaped like a maple leaf. If you hold the maple leaf window up to a light source (about one meter away) and put your eye on it, the denomination number of that specific bill will appear around the light source.

Withdrawn denominations

The 1935 series was the only series to have included $25 and $500 denominations. Both denominations were short lived. The $25 note was withdrawn on May 18, 1937. Stacks of unissued 1935 $500 notes were destroyed in February 1938, and issued $500 notes were recalled and withdrawn from circulation five months later.

Some of the most significant recent developments in Canadian currency were the withdrawal of the $1, $2, and $1,000 notes in 1989, 1996, and 2000 respectively. The $1 and $2 denominations have been replaced with coins, colloquially referred to as the "loonie" and "toonie" respectively. The $1,000 note was removed at the request of the Solicitor General of Canada, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, as it was reported that they were largely being used for money laundering and organized crime.

List of Bank of Canada bank note series

1935 Series

The Bank of Canada was created in 1934 and given responsibility, through an Act of Parliament, to regulate the country's money supply and to "promote the economic and financial welfare of Canada." Accordingly, it was given the exclusive right to issue bank notes in Canada. On 11 March 1935, the Bank of Canada issued its first series of bank notes.

1937 Series

The creation of a second series of bank notes, only two years after the first issue, was prompted by changes in Canadian government legislation requiring the Bank of Canada to produce bilingual bank notes. Another contributing factor was the death of King George V on 20 January 1936 and the subsequent abdication of Edward VIII.

1954 Series

The third series of Bank of Canada bank notes was prepared in 1952. Significant changes to the design of Canada's paper currency gave it a whole new look that set the standard for the future.

With the ascension to the throne of Queen Elizabeth II in 1952, plates were prepared for the third series of Bank of Canada notes. They were very different from the 1937 series, although the colours and bilingual nature were retained. The portrait was moved from the centre of the bank note to the right-hand side where it was less susceptible to wear caused by the folding of notes. The elaborate detail of earlier issues was simplified, and the earlier allegorical figures were replaced by Canadian landscapes. The Canadian coat of arms was first introduced in this series and formed part of the background design. This is the only series on which the portrait of the Queen appears on all denominations.

1969 Scenes of Canada Series

Because of a growing concern over counterfeiting, the Bank of Canada began to release a new series of bank notes in 1969.

This series represented another complete departure in design from earlier issues:

• colourful, wavy patterns were introduced;
• a new series of Canadian scenic vignettes was created;
• portraits of former Canadian prime ministers were re-introduced.

1986 Birds of Canada Series

2001 Canadian Journey Series

Beginning in 2001, the Bank of Canada introduced a new series of bills called "Canadian Journey", featuring images of Canadian heritage and excerpts from Canadian literature. The $10 was first issued on January 17, 2001; the $5 on March 27, 2002; the $100 bill on March 17, 2004, the $20 on September 29, 2004, and the $50 on November 17, 2004.

The $20, $50, and $100 dollar notes introduce watermark security features for the first time on Canadian currency since the four-dollar Dominion notes; they also boast significantly expanded holographic security features. Also among the new features are a windowed colour-shifting thread woven into the paper, a see-through number, and enhanced fluorescence under ultraviolet lighting. These features are reliable, quick and easy to use, and are designed to help Canadians protect themselves by detecting counterfeit notes. All post-2001 series notes also include the EURion constellation, on both sides of the bill. The new bills have a tactile feature, which is a series of raised dots (but not Braille) in the upper right corner on the face of each bill to aid the visually impaired in identifying currency denominations.

The security features new on the $20, $50, and $100 notes were added to an updated version of the $10 note released on 18 May 2005, and the Bank of Canada began issuing a $5 note with upgraded security features on 15 November 2006 as part of its ongoing effort to improve the security of Canadian bank notes. The illustrations on the front and back of the upgraded notes are the same as those on the $5 and $10 notes issued in 2001 and 2002.

The "Canadian Journey" literary excerpts are printed in English and French, with the English versions being:

• $5: The winters of my childhood were long, long seasons. We lived in three places—the school, the church, and the skating-rink—but our real life was on the skating-rink. (Roch Carrier (b. 1937) from his short story Le chandail de hockey (The Hockey Sweater))
• $10: In Flanders Fields the poppies blow / Between the crosses, row on row, / That mark our place, and in the sky / The larks, still bravely singing, fly / Scarce heard amid the guns below. (John McCrae (1872–1918), from his poem In Flanders Fields)
• $20: Could we ever know each other in the slightest without the arts? (Gabrielle Roy (1909–1983) from her novel La Montagne secrète (The Hidden Mountain))
• $50: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights (from Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948)
• $100: Do we ever remember that somewhere above the sky in some child's dream perhaps Jacques Cartier is still sailing, always on his way always about to discover a new Canada? (Miriam Waddington (1917–2004) from her poem Jacques Cartier in Toronto)

Canadian Journey banknotes (2004 style) incorporates background color and consists of series years 2001, 2003, 2003A, 2004, 2004A and 2006. All the notes except the $100 bill have additional series years 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2009A (some banknotes only). The $100 2009 series began issuing to the public in early 2010 and was printed in 2009 before they were issued. The 2004-2009 series of the $100 bill would be withdrawn from the circulation by the end of this year in November 2011. The $50 bill will be withdrawn on March 2012 and $5–$20 bills would be withdrawn in the next 2 years before it will be officially announced.

2011 Frontier Series

Beginning in 2011, the Bank of Canada introduced a new series of polymer banknotes. The $100 bill was the issued on November 14, 2011; the $50 was issued on March 26, 2012; the $20 banknote will be issued in November 2012, and the $10 and $5 denominations will be issued by late 2013.

These are the first Canadian notes produced on polymer. In place of a watermark are two visual features; a translucent maple leaf and a transparent window. The leaf includes a security feature that, when viewed close to the eye with a single-point light source behind, produces a circular image displaying the note's denomination. The window is fringed by maple leaves; at its top is a smaller version of the portrait, and at its bottom a light-refracting metallic likeness of an architectural feature from the parliament buildings. The portraits on the face are more centred on the bill, and are more photo-realistic, rather than engraved art. The backs of the bills introduce new cultural and thematic imagery, but the literary quotation is not continued. The polymer bills continue the tactile feature, from the Canadian Journey series.^[11]

Commemorative Issues

‡ Withdrawn from circulation. Currency withdrawn from circulation is still legal tender. Despite the introduction of new notes, the 1986 series $20, $50, and $100 are still occasionally used; $1,000 notes are rare.

All bills of 1954 series or later measure 152.4 mm by 69.85 mm (6 by 2¾ inches).

See also Withdrawn Canadian banknotes.

Myths

A number of myths have circulated regarding Canadian banknotes.

• An American flag is flying over the Parliament buildings on Canadian paper money. This is not the case. The Birds series bills depict a Union Flag flying over Parliament on the $100; a Canadian Red Ensign (a former Canadian flag) on the $5, $10, and $50; and the modern maple-leaf flag was on the $2 bills. (The $20 depicts the Library of Parliament, with no flag visible.) Those "taken" by the rumour were likely fooled by the bills with the Red Ensign, as the flags are very small and not shown in full colour, and the Ensign with its contrasting canton somewhat resembles the American flag.^[13]
• When a bill depicts a past prime minister, the Parliament buildings behind him are flying whichever flag Canada was using at the time of his tenure. The face of the Birds series featured images of prime ministers (or the Queen) and the houses of Parliament. However, as noted above, the $10 note featured the Red Ensign alongside Sir John A. Macdonald, who became prime minister 25 years before the Red Ensign was approved for use on the Merchant Marine and more than 50 years before it was used on government buildings.^[14] Also, the Union Flag is on the $100 with Sir Robert Borden, who came after Laurier who appears with the Red Ensign. This is sometimes explained by the fact that Borden governed during World War I.^[15] The views of the Houses of Parliament on the current Canadian Journey series do not feature any flag.
• The Canadian Journey series $10 bill is being recalled because there is a misprint in the poem In Flanders Fields. The first line as printed, "In Flanders fields the poppies blow," startled many people, who believed the last word should be "grow". John McCrae wrote two versions which were both published, but his original manuscript, the one used by the government and widely used for Remembrance Day ceremonies, reads "blow". (The last two lines are, "We shall not sleep, though poppies grow/In Flanders fields.")^[16][17]

See also

• Where's Willy?

References

• R. J. Graham Canadian Bank Notes 6th Edition: A Charlton Standard Catalogue Charlton Press July 17, 2008

External links

• Canadian Bank Notes Price Guide
• Canadian Paper Money
• Canadian Currency (in French)
• The Online Canadian Paper Money Museum
• The Where's Willy? Currency Tracking Project
• Statistics Canada - Bank of Canada banknote liabilities
• Bank of Canada Currency Museum

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