What's green, black, blue and peach? New $20 bill
By Deborah Adamson
Advertiser Staff Writer
For the first time in nearly a century, the United States has printed money in colors besides green and black. That new $20 bill will go into circulation nationwide starting Thursday.
Associated Press library photo • Aug. 19, 2003
The bill will remain recognizable as a "greenback," but it also has subdued blue, peach and green tones in the background.
The Bureau of Engraving and Printing unveiled the design of the new $20 bill in May.
In the next two years, redesigned $50 and $100 bills will be introduced. New looks for the $10 and $5 notes are still under consideration. So far, no changes are planned for the $1 bill.
As more denominations of currency take a new look, consumers will be able to tell them apart by their color, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.
"It's to enhance security and make it harder to counterfeit," said Susan Stawick, press aide for the Federal Reserve Board, which handles distribution of the currency to member banks.
In Hawai'i, the new-look $20 bills will be arriving later than in many other states.
Bank of Hawaii has placed an order for the new bills and should be getting them in early December, said spokesman Stafford Kiguchi.
First Hawaiian Bank spokesman Gerry Keir said the bank "expects to get bills in when they issue them from the Fed" but didn't provide a time line.
Bank of Hawaii is providing some training to its tellers in anticipation of questions from customers about the new bills, Kiguchi said.
Consumers can continue to use their old $20 bills, which won't expire, Stawick said.
The new $20 bill features two American eagles as symbols of freedom — a large blue eagle to the left of President Andrew Jackson's picture, and a smaller green eagle to the lower right.
It also has more "microprinted" words — minu-scule letters that serve as another deterrent to counterfeiting.
The bill retains its watermark, security thread and color-shifting ink on the numeral 20 in the lower-right corner.
U.S. currency was last printed with a colorful background in 1905. That was the $20 Gold Certificate, which had a gold tint and a red seal and serial number.
Reach Deborah Adamson at dadamson@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8088.
