Continental Currency May 10, 1775 $30 Pink Counterfeit Detector PCGS Extremely Fine 45.
In over 50 years in the business, this cataloger had never handled a pink counterfeit detector until two years ago. This piece is now our third all from totally divergent sources and likely the majority of the pieces in existence. When we sold the first of the three, we used this description: "Counterfeit Detectors were printed from the same plates as the genuine notes. They were prepared to distribute to merchants and financial institutions so that they could compare notes that they received in the normal course of business to the detector notes to determine genuineness. As a deterrent to prevent detectors from being signed, numbered, and spent, they were printed on colored paper, almost always blue. A very few detectors were printed on pinkish paper, which was actually close in color to the normal paper but with thousands of small pink fibers manufactured in, to give it a pinkish cast. This is the first example that HCAA or our predecessor company CAA has ever handled. It is in fact only the second example that this cataloger has ever seen. We are aware of one other that we have not seen; all three examples are $30 detectors from the May 10, 1775 issue. It appears from the existence of a half sheet that the $1 to $8 denominations of this first issue of Continentals were produced in the normal blue. The $30 denomination was produced separately and the paper used for these was this pink tinted paper. Certainly a subject for future research; but beyond a doubt extremely rare". The first we sold was an AU 53 in our 2015 Long Beach Sale which realized over $5400. The second was in FUN of 2016 graded 58 and realizing $3525. Based on the face to back alignment, it appears all three have come from a single sheet and very likely only one sheet was produced. There is a second theory, equally creditable, that these notes were not part of an all thirty dollar sheet but were part of a sheet where the $8 note was removed and replaced by the $30. Future research will likely confirm which is accurate, but in either event, these are of the highest rarity and the key note to a Continental Detector Set. The other two examples were slightly higher grade, but this one is from the upper right corner of the sheet and has by far the best centering as well as two jumbo margins.

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