Identify valuable £50 notes featuring Alan Turing that you might encounter:
The Bank of England has issued the final banknote in the polymer series, celebrating the life and work of the renowned scientist and mathematician, Alan Turing. The new £50 note, unveiled on Turing's 109th birthday, 23rd June 2021, is a testament to his significant contributions to code-breaking during World War II at Bletchley Park.
Each cypher of the new notes, with 'AA' being the first, has 999,000 serial numbers printed, resulting in a total of 59,940,000 notes for the first 'AA' cypher. Serial numbers representing key dates related to Alan Turing, such as '23 061912' (Turing's date of birth), '07 061954' (Turing's death), '19 121954' (Turing's birth and death combined), and '09 071941' (the date that the Enigma code was cracked by Turing and his team at Bletchley Park), are considered collectable.
Interestingly, serial numbers like 'AK47' and 'James Bond 007' are also expected to be popular among collectors. Consecutively numbered notes, such as the three consecutive 'AA01' notes, have already garnered attention, with a set selling for £456.
The new £50 note features a design of Turing's Automatic Computing Engine (ACE) Pilot Machine, technical drawings for the British Bombe, and a photo of Turing from 1951. A unique feature is the ticker tape depicting Alan Turing's birth date in binary code. The note also boasts a large see-through window with a metallic microchip image and clovers around the outside.
In recognition of Turing's work and that of his team at Bletchley Park, the first institutions to receive the new £50 banknotes were the Bank of England itself and key financial institutions on the day of the note's issuance, March 25, 2021. The Bank of England notably raised the rainbow flag instead of the British national flag on this day.
The 'Polymer Banknote Collecting Pack' can securely house all four polymer banknotes featuring Queen Elizabeth II and the four new polymer banknotes featuring King Charles III, including the Alan Turing £50 note. The 'Bletchley Post Office' was one of the first places to have the new £50 note in 2021.
Remarkably, the Bank of England holds back some of the notes with the earliest serial numbers for donation. This makes the hunt for the earliest serial numbers even more exciting for collectors. The new £50 note is a fitting tribute to a man whose work continues to shape our understanding of computing and code-breaking.
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