Publications and Research

Summer 1997

The fiscal impact of privatization in Canada by Mylène Levac and Philip Wooldridge The new bank note distribution system by Gerrit Bilkes

Cover: Samuel Zimmerman and the Zimmerman Bank

There is a touch of irony in this note. The trains shown on the note not only refer to the business of the bank's president and principal shareholder, Samuel Zimmerman, but they also indicate the manner of his death.

Samuel Zimmerman was one of the richest men in the province of Canada during the 1850s. An American, he immigrated to Canada in 1842 and within a short time had amassed a fortune as a railway contractor, building for the Great Western, the Woodstock and Lake Erie, and the Erie and Ontario lines. He also built lake steamers, owned a hotel, and founded his own bank, appropriately named the Zimmerman Bank. On the night of 12 March 1857, Zimmerman was killed when the train on which he was travelling from Toronto to Hamilton derailed and fell into the Desjardins Canal. At his funeral, he was lauded for his accomplishments and connections, but it has been suggested that he used less than ethical means to achieve his goals.

This view is supported by what we know of the Zimmerman Bank. Less than half of its capital of $1,000,000 was ever paid up, and the Receiver General of the day used public funds to prop up the bank. As it turned out, both the bank and Zimmerman were in debt to the Bank of Upper Canada for more than $500,000. The bank continued to operate after Zimmerman's death, but eventually its charter was sold to an entrepreneur from Chicago who renamed the bank and used it to issue notes that he had no intention of redeeming.

This note is part of the third and last issue of the Zimmerman Bank. No notes of this group are known to have been issued legitimately. Many of these notes bear fraudulent dates and signatures, as does this one.

This note is part of the National Currency Collection, Bank of Canada.

Photography by James Zagon.