Talk:James Brown House

History section addition project feedback

As a way to work on researching and writing, my history class has been given the assignment to work on editing or creating a Wikipedia page. This is a rough draft of the page I'm proposing to create. I would greatly appreciate→ any feedback that anyone would be willing to give me. The finished project will be due in two weeks, on October 13, 2014. For the present, I more worried about the actual content of the page. I will definitely be working on the formatting, as well as adding the sources of my information. Thank you in advance for any comments.

Jim Brown House

The Jim Brown House, also known as the Brown-Bender House, was originally constructed in the late 1840's. The house is situated due east of Ira and Akron-Peninsula Roads in Peninsula, Ohio, U.S.A.. Its sits back off the road, up a winding and steep driveway, and upon a hill. The house is a four over four Greek Revival House (four rooms over four rooms). This style of house was popular in the 19th century in America as the country greatly identified with Greek philosophy and politics. The house is white, supposedly resembling the great marble architecture of Greece. Also typical of this style, the roof has a lower pitch and the entrance door is framed with wide trim.

Jim Brown - The Man

More notable than the actual house is to whom the house belonged. Jim Brown, the owner, was a notorious money counterfeiter. This man generally sold five thousand dollars of fake, counterfeit bills for one thousand dollars of legitimate money. How did he do this? He took full advantage of the economy at the time. During the Revolutionary War, the Continental Congress authorized issuing American currency. This was a further step to gaining independence from England, no longer relying on English money. Though the government did not issue paper money until 1861, around 1,600 banks were allowed to print and circulate their own money. This was to be regulated by state charters. 7,000 different state currency notes ended up in circulation!

With so many variations of paper bills and so many banks issuing them, it was extremely difficult for anyone to determine if bills came from a legitimate source, or bank. Jim Brown cashed in on this flaw in the banking system. After buying items in New Orleans to resell in the Orient, Brown was finally caught and returned to Boston, Ohio. His crime was not taken very seriously, as the people of the time felt that it was better to have counterfeit money than no money at all. Now back in Boston, Ohio, he was then elected as Justice of the Peace.

References

1) http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/index.php?title=ffJim_Brown

2) http://www.secretservice.gov/money_history.shtml

3) http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=9579866