Canadian banknotes

Canadian banknotes are the banknotes of Canada, denominated in Canadian dollars (CAD). In common everyday usage, they are called bills. Currently, they are issued in five, ten, twenty, fifty, and hundred dollar denominations by the Bank of Canada.

Production

Bills are issued by the Bank of Canada, but the actual production of the bills is outsourced to the Canadian Bank Note Company in accordance with the specifications and requirements of the Bank of Canada. All wording on bills appears in both Canada's official languages, English and French.

Removal of $1 and $2 bills

Some of the most significant recent developments in Canadian currency were the withdrawal of the $1 and $2 bills in 1987 and 1996, respectively, and their replacement with new coins.

See loonie and toonie.

Canadian Journey

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 new $10 was first issued on January 17, 2001; the new $5 on March 27, 2002; the new $100 bill on March 17, 2004, the new $20 on September 29, 2004, and the new $50 on November 17, 2004.

The $20, $50, and $100 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 from accepting counterfeit notes. All 2001 through 2005 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 in Braille) in the upper right corner on the obverse 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 will issue a $5 note with upgraded security features beginning 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))
$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 his way always about to discover a new Canada? (Miriam Waddington (1917-2004) from her poem Jacques Cartier in Toronto)

List of bank notes

Canadian banknotes - an exhaustive list

1935 Series
Image		Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date
		$1‡	Green	King George V	Agriculture allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$2‡	Blue	Queen Mary	Transportation allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$5‡	Orange	Edward, Prince of Wales	Electric power allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$10‡	Purple	Princess Mary	Harvest allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$20‡	Rose Pink	Princess Elizabeth	Agriculture allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$50‡	Brown	Prince Albert, Duke of York	Modern Inventions allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$100‡	Dark Brown	Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester	Commerce and industry allegory	1935	11 March 1935
$500‡	Sepia	Sir John A. Macdonald	Fertility allegory	1935	11 March 1935
		$1000‡	Dark Green	Sir Wilfrid Laurier	Security allegory	1935	11 March 1935

1937 Series
Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date
$1‡	Green	King George VI	Agriculture allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$2‡	Terra cotta	King George VI	Harvest allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$5‡	Blue	King George VI	Electric power allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$10‡	Purple	King George VI	Transportation allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$20‡	Olive Green	King George VI	Fertility allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$50‡	Orange	King George VI	Modern Inventions allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$100‡	Brown	Sir John A. Macdonald	Commerce and industry allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937
$1000‡	Rose Pink	Sir Wilfrid Laurier	Security allegory	2 January 1937	19 July 1937

1954 series
Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date
$1‡	Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Saskatchewan prairie	1954	9 September 1954
$2‡	Terra cotta	Queen Elizabeth II	A country scene, Richmond, Quebec	1954	9 September 1954
$5‡	Blue	Queen Elizabeth II	Otter Falls, (Aishihik River), Yukon	1954	9 September 1954
$10‡	Purple	Queen Elizabeth II	Mount Burgess, British Columbia	1954	9 September 1954
$20‡	Olive Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Winter landscape, Laurentian Mountains, Quebec	1954	9 September 1954
$50‡	Orange	Queen Elizabeth II	Lockeport Beach, Nova Scotia	1954	9 September 1954
$100‡	Brown	Queen Elizabeth II	Okanagan Lake, British Columbia	1954	9 September 1954
$1000‡	Rose Pink	Queen Elizabeth II	Anse-Sainte-Jean, Quebec	1954	9 September 1954

1969-1979 ("Scenes of Canada") series
Image		Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date	Ceased Being Issued
$1‡	Dark green	Queen Elizabeth II	The parliament buildings from the Ottawa River, Ontario	1973	3 June 1974	30 June 1989
		$2‡	Terra cotta	Queen Elizabeth II	Inuit hunting on Baffin Island, Northwest Territories	1974	5 August 1975	Newer $2 issued date
		$5‡	Blue	Sir Wilfrid Laurier	Salmon seiner BCP 45 in Johnstone Straits, British Columbia	1972	4 December 1972	Newer $5 issued date
		$5‡	Blue	Sir Wilfrid Laurier		1979	1 October 1979	Newer $5 issued date
		$10‡	Purple	Sir John A. Macdonald	Oil refinery in Sarnia, Ontario	1971	8 November 1971	Newer $10 issued date
		$20‡	Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Moraine Lake and the Rocky Mountains, Alberta	1969	22 June 1969	Newer $20 issued date
		$20‡	Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Moraine Lake and the Rocky Mountains, Alberta	1979	18 December 1979	Newer $20 issued date
		$50‡	Red	William Lyon Mackenzie King	The RCMP Musical Ride	1975	31 March 1975	Newer $50 issued date
		$100‡	Brown	Sir Robert Borden	Lunenburg Harbour, Nova Scotia	1975	31 May 1976	Newer $100 issued date

1986 ("Birds of Canada") series
Image		Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date	Ceased Being Issued
$2	Terra cotta	Queen Elizabeth II	American robins	1986	2 September 1986	16 February 1996
		$5	Blue	Sir Wilfrid Laurier	Belted kingfisher	1986	28 April 1986	Newer $5 issued date
		$10	Purple	Sir John A. Macdonald	Osprey	1989	27 June 1989	Newer $10 issued date
		$20	Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Common loon	1991	29 June 1993	Newer $20 issued date
		$50	Red	William Lyon Mackenzie King	Snowy owl	1988	1 December 1989	Newer $50 issued date
$100	Brown	Sir Robert Borden	Canada goose	1988	3 December 1990	Newer $100 issued date
$1000	Reddish purple	Queen Elizabeth II	Pine grosbeak	1988	4 May 1992	12 May 2000

2001 ("Canadian Journey") series (pictured top right)
Image		Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date	Watermark
five-dollar bill >$5" target="_blank" >^*	Blue	Sir Wilfrid Laurier	Children playing hockey and other winter sports; excerpt from "The Hockey Sweater" by Roch Carrier	2001	27 March 2002
five-dollar bill >$5" target="_blank" >^*	Blue	Sir Wilfrid Laurier		2005	15 November 2006
		ten-dollar bill >$10" target="_blank" >^*	Purple	Sir John A. Macdonald	Peacekeeping forces and war memorial; excerpt from "In Flanders Fields" by John McCrae	2000	17 January 2001
ten-dollar bill >$10" target="_blank" >^*	2005	18 May 2005	Purple	Sir John A. Macdonald
twenty-dollar bill >$20" target="_blank" >^*	Green	Queen Elizabeth II	Artwork of Bill Reid; excerpt from Gabrielle Roy's novel, The Hidden Mountain.	2004	29 September 2004	As portrait
fifty-dollar bill >$50" target="_blank" >^*	Red	William Lyon Mackenzie King	The Famous Five and Thérèse Casgrain; quotation from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights	2004	17 November 2004	As portrait
hundred-dollar bill >$100" target="_blank" >^*	Brown	Sir Robert Borden	Maps of Canada, historic and modern; excerpt from Miriam Waddington's poem, "Jacques Cartier in Toronto"	2003	17 March 2004	As portrait

Commemorative Issues
Image		Value	Colour	Obverse	Reverse	Printed Date	Issued Date
$25‡	Purple	King George V and Queen Mary	Windsor Castle	May 6, 1935
		$1‡	Dark Green	Elizabeth II	Old parliament buildings in Ottawa - destroyed by fire in 1916	1967	3 January 1967

‡ Withdrawn from circulation. Currency withdrawn from circulation is still legal tender. As of early 2005, the 1986-series $5 and $10 bills are still occasionally encountered, but they are rapidly disappearing from regular use. Despite the introduction of new notes, the 1986 $20, $50, and $100 are still common. $1,000 bills are no longer printed, but are still used by banks and casinos occasionally.

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

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 Jack 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 and $1000 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.

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 obverse 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. Also, the Union Jack 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. The views of the Houses of Parliament on the current Canadian Journey series do not feature any flag.

The new 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", meaning to bloom. (The last two lines are, "We shall not sleep, though poppies grow/In Flanders fields.")

External links

Currencies of Canada