Snowmman: How difficult would it be for your program to also look for $20s that were 1963 as well as the 1963A, 1969, etc? And serial numbers that are a close match?
fcastle866
I've thought along the lines you're suggested and done some stuff. I can do anything, the question is what is useful.
Based on the manual work I did with the serial numbers, I thought hard about the FBI people doing similar manual entry back in 1971 (from microfilm to apparent computer entry for sort) and the possibility of errors in that process.
I have noted the apparent FBI errors in the files in the zip. Both egregious and not egregious. Since BEP records could be erroneous (they have before in some cases)...I didn't change all FBI serials to match BEP records.
The series numbers for a number of 1950C bills seem wrong. I think some should be 1950D.
Since the series number is smaller on a bill, compared to the serial, it's possible there were errors in a larger number of series numbers. Don't know.
Also, it's easy to have the A vs B trailing letter wrong (data entry typo) in the 1963A bills, and we'd have no way of telling. Etc.
So I was thinking: what if the district or trailing A, B, C, D was wrong (there is at least one typo with a D)
I could search for all combinations of districts and trailing A, B, for a given number and ignore the series year (for instance if 1963 vs 1963A error or 1969 etc.)
But the problem is: google search doesn't hit any collector sites for serial number searches (just dbcooperforum). I also think collectors don't list serials as much as we would like. I have hit on a $1 bill with a matching serial number, so that's interesting.
And on ebay, it's rare that they list the serial number in text.
I have done an automated ebay search for 1963A and 1969 serials, and it captures the ebay images. I can manually eyeball the serial and compare to the list
One thing that could be done, is to write an article for a collectors magazine, and provide, say, the list of star notes. That's a smaller list. That could generate interest. Could have a link to the full text list, so people could check other notes. Attached the list of star notes. (343 of them)
Or make the full list easily accessible online.
I think the interesting thing would be if all collectors could easily search their pile of 1963A and 1969 notes (minimally). Although: the other districts with smaller print runs, might be more likely to be in collections...people like to have "all districts" etc. Like an oddball district star note could turn up, even though it's only a small number in the cooper list. It's about matching "collectibility" I think, not sheer number printed or present in the cooper list.
It's been difficult for people to search their notes.
Maybe in the future, there will be more automation of currency serials that people have in their collections.
I think collectors are a vast untapped resource here for checking bills.
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