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Before the American Revolution, Americans used English, Spanish, and French currencies.
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American colonists issued a paper currency for the Continental Congress to finance the Revolutionary War.
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The Continental Congress chartered the first "real" bank in Philidelphia to give further financial support to the Revolutionary War. This bank was called the Bank of North America.
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Continental Congress adopted the dollar as the unit for national currency.
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The Federal Monetary System was established with the creation of the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia. The first American coins were struck in 1793.
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The Second Bank of the U.S. was granted a 20 year charter.
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With minimum regulation, 1,600 state chartered, private banks issued paper money. With over 30,000 varieties of color and design these state bank notes were easily counterfeited, which combined with bank failures to cause confusion and circulation problems.
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Congress, pressed to finance the Civil War, authorized the United States Treasury to issue paper money for the first time in the form of non-interest bearing Treasury Notes called Demand Notes.
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Demand Notes were replaced by United States Notes, commonly called "greenbacks." These had a green tint that was introduced to discourage photographic conterfeiting.
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The design of U.S. currency incorporated a Treasury seal, fine-line engraving, and distinctive cotton and linen paper with embedded red and blue fibers.
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The Department of Treasury established the U.S. Secret Service to control counterfeiting. (At that time 1/3 of all circulating currency was estimated to be counterfeit.)
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Gold Certificates were issued by the Department of the Treasury against gold coin and bullion deposits and were circulated until 1933.
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The Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing started printing all U.S. currency.
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The Federal Reserve System was created as the nation's central bank to regulate the flow of money and credit for economic stability and growth.
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Currency was reduced in size by 25 percent, and a consistent design was introduced with uniform portraits on the front and emblems and monuments on the back.
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Paper currency was first issued with the inscription “In God We Trust”. The inscription appears on all currency Series 1963 and later.
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A security thread and microprinting were introduced to deter counterfeiting by advanced copiers and printers. These features first appeared in Series 1990 $100, $50 and the $20 dollar bills.
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Currency was to be redesigned to incorporate a new series of counterfeit deterrents. The newly designed $100 was introduced in 1996, the $50 in 1997, and the $20 in 1998.
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5 new quarters are to be released every year, over a period of 10 years, featuring a design that honors each state's unique history and tradition. The quarters are being released in the order that the states joined the union.
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The U.S. Treasury introduced redesigned $5 and $10 bills to make counterfeiting more difficult.The new notes feature oversized pictures of Abraham Lincoln and Alexander Hamilton that are slightly off-center. Other anti-counterfeiting measures include watermarks that can be seen under a light, security threads that glow when exposed to ultraviolet light and tiny printing that’s visible with the help of a magnifying glass.
