America 250: How fake money built America
In the first half of the 19th century, for example, the Midwest was so short of authentic banknotes that people knowingly accepted counterfeit ones. “This was a region that needed money,” Mihm writes, “and counterfeiters provided it.”
California, by contrast, was comparatively hostile to faked notes. Miners expected to exchange the gold they dug up for notes that were at least partly backed by precious metal. When $100,000 of Bank of Missouri notes were found to be counterfeit, an avenging group of miners chased the counterfeiter all the way to New York.
