You know, you probably tapped your phone to buy
your morning coffee today, or maybe you swiped
a card without even really looking at the screen.
Yeah, we treat money as just purely transactional
now. It's basically an invisible data transfer
floating in the ether. Right. But if I asked
you to actually pull a physical $20 note out
of your wallet and hold it up to the light. You
wouldn't just be looking at a tool for buying
a sandwich. No, absolutely not. You'd be holding
this fractured, microscopically perfect magic
trick designed to thwart international crime
syndicates, which is exactly our mission for
today's deep dive. We are exploring this comprehensive
Wikipedia article detailing the history, the
design and the evolution of the Australian twenty
dollar note. It's a great topic because physical
currency is never just about commerce. You know,
it's a highly engineered snapshot of national
identity. It really is. It tells you exactly
what a nation values, who its heroes are, and
how it wants to present itself to the world,
and to its enemies, really, at a specific point
in time. Okay, let's unpack this. Because I am
just marveling at the sheer volume of history
printed on a flexible plastic rectangle that
is, what, only 144 by 65 millimeters? Yeah, it's
a tiny canvas. Yeah. But to understand it, we
really have to go back to the beginning. The
birth of the $20 note. on a very specific date,
February 14th, 1966. Valentine's Day, 1966. Right.
And this wasn't just a new design. It was a monumental
psychological shift for the entire country. Because
that was the day Australia formally ditched the
old British system, right? The Australian pound?
Correct. They dropped the complicated shillings
and pence and they shifted to the new clean base
10 decimal system, the Australian dollar. Wait,
okay. If you're trying to completely overhaul
a nation's currency system and get citizens used
to base ten dollars instead of pounds, why do
the sources say they deliberately kept the new
twenty dollar note the same color as the old
ten pound note? It's funny. Right. It sounds
totally counterintuitive. Yeah. Doesn't that
defeat the whole point of a fresh start? Well,
it was actually a brilliant piece of behavioral
economics. I mean, imagine the sheer chaos of
waking up one morning and the entire mathematical
foundation of how you buy groceries has changed.
Oh, man. Yeah. would panic exactly they wanted
to smooth out that psychological transition by
keeping the visual language familiar like if
your old 10 -pound note was orange your new equivalent
$20 note is gonna be orange yeah they anchored
the new scary math to a familiar visual cue which
brings us to the great color debate Is the note
actually red or is it orange? Ah, the classic
argument. The article officially clarifies this,
by the way. It's a highly specific mix of Clinton
red and orange, specifically chosen to represent
the deep, dusty, iron -rich earth of the Australian
outback. Right. But because of that very distinct,
aggressive red -orange hue... The public almost
instantly gave it one of the greatest nicknames
in global currency. The lobster. The lobster.
It's just so distinctly Australian to immediately
strip the formality away from national currency
with a colloquial nickname like that. And they
printed so many of them. The sources note that
by June 2017, there were 164 million of these
lobsters in circulation. That's roughly 11 percent
of all banknotes out there. It carried a total
physical value of over 3 .2 billion dollars.
That is a lot of lobsters. It is, but here's
the thing that really caught my eye about those
early days. It's like a corporate brand refresh
where the executives were too afraid to completely
let go of their original logo. So what do you
mean? Well from its launch in 1966 all the way
until 1974, the main title printed on the note
didn't just say Australia, it read Commonwealth
of Australia. What's fascinating here is how
a simple typographical change on a piece of paper
perfectly mirrors a nation's shifting politics.
Right. During that first eight -year run they
pumped out nearly 147 million of those Commonwealth
of Australia notes. It was this lingering psychological
tie to the British Empire. But then in 1974 they
deliberately drop Commonwealth of. Yep and from
then until the end of the paper era in 1994 they
printed over 1 .6 billion notes that simply confidently
read Australia. It's subtle. But dropping those
two words is essentially a mass distributed declaration
of independence handed out in change at every
bakery and petrol station in the country. Precisely.
They were stepping out of the colonial shadow
and asserting themselves on the global stage
as this modern, independent entity. So let's
look at that first canvas, the paper era, because
the intellectual themes they chose to display
on this new, confident currency are wild. They
really are. You flip this note over, and it is
entirely dedicated to the obsession with flight
and physics. On the obverse of the front, you
have Sir Charles Kingsford Smith, the legendary
aviator. And on the reverse, you have Lawrence
Hargrave, alongside his intricate drawings of
early aircraft designs. Which makes sense for
an aviation theme. Definitely, because Hargrave's
box kites and aerodynamic theories were actually
instrumental in the development of early flight
globally. He even influenced the Wright brothers.
But the designers didn't just put their portraits
on the note. Behind Kingsford Smith, there is
literal complex math. The curves, right? Yeah.
The design explicitly includes five Lasage's
curves drawn by a two -pendulum hermitograph.
Now I have to ask, on behalf of the listener,
what on earth is a two pendulum harmonograph?
Quite the contraption. And why dedicate incredibly
valuable real estate on your national currency
to abstract physics equations instead of just
slapping another politician on there? Well, to
understand the harmonograph, imagine tying a
pen to two swinging pendulums. One is swinging
side to side, the other is swinging back and
forth. Okay, I'm picturing it. As they lose momentum,
the pen draws these beautiful, complex, overlapping
continuous loops. Those are Lasage's curves.
They visually represent the mathematics of complex
frequencies, vibrations, and resonance. Okay,
but how does swinging a pen on a pendulum relate
to flying an airplane? Because resonance is the
exact physics you need to master to keep an airplane
from shaking itself apart in the sky. Oh wow,
I didn't even think of that. Yeah, if you've
ever seen a washing machine violently vibrate
and break during a spin cycle because the load
is unbalanced, that's resonance. Now imagine
that mathematical force acting on a canvas and
wood biplane over the Pacific Ocean. Putting
those curves on the note wasn't just decorative,
it was a statement. So they were showing off
their priorities. Exactly. The paper note was
designed in an era where conquering the skies
was the absolute pinnacle of human progress.
Australia was telling its citizens that it valued
intellect, the mechanics of progress, and the
underlying math that made survival possible.
It's a literal physics lesson in your pocket.
And speaking of the details on those paper notes,
there's a great nugget in the sources for the
collectors listening. Oh, the signatures. Yes.
Throughout the entire lifespan of the $20 note,
the printing plates had to be updated to feature
exactly 14 different signature combinations.
Right. The signatures of the governor of the
Reserve Bank and the secretary to the treasury.
They act as the official authorization of the
currency's value. And if you happen to be checking
your old paper notes in a shoe box somewhere,
pay attention to the dates. The 1967 issue was
printed for only a single year. Which makes it
incredibly valuable to collectors today. Exactly.
And the 1989 combination featuring the signatures
of Philip and Frasier was issued for even less
than a year. That's a rare find. But eventually
the era of paper comes to an end, we conquer
the skies, and then the narrative of the currency
shifts dramatically downward, back down to the
dirt. Specifically to the harsh, unforgiving
terrain of the Australian outback. Because in
1994, Australia didn't just redesign the artwork.
They pioneered a massive technological shift.
From paper to polymer banknotes. Biaxially oriented
polypropylene, to be exact. That's a mouthful.
But yes, plastic money. Here's where it gets
really interesting. Because when they switched
to polymer in 1994, they brought in designer
Gary Emory. And the sheer density of Easter eggs
he packed into this new design is staggering.
It really is a crowded canvas. It's like a Where's
Waldo of Outback history. I'm looking at the
description and you've got a sailing ship, a
biplane, early colonial buildings. And wait,
is that a guy riding a camel? It sure is. Let's
break down exactly who these people are. On the
front, we have Mary Rybie. How does someone featured
in the source's convict templates end up on the
$20 note? Her story is incredible. She wasn't
born into royalty. She was actually convicted
of horse stealing in England as a teenager. Wait,
seriously? Yeah. She disguised herself as a boy,
got caught, and was transported to the penal
colony of Australia. But instead of letting that
dictate her life, she eventually became one of
the most successful shipping magnates and entrepreneurs
in the colony's history. That is an amazing turnaround.
It is. So her portrait sits alongside an early
colonial building in Sydney and the sailing ship
Mercury, which represents the fleet she built
from absolutely nothing. So the front is about
economic triumph over circumstance. And then
you flip it over to the reverse, and it is a
master class in outback survival. Completely
different vibe. Yeah. You have Reverend John
Flynn, who founded what became Frontier Services,
and the world famous Royal Flying Doctor Service.
And to represent that, there's a Qantas -supplied
de Havilland DH -50 biplane named Victory right
there with him. But what really caught my attention
was the inclusion of the pedal wireless, invented
by Alfred Herman Traeger. Oh, the pedal wireless
completely revolutionized outback survival. How
so? Well, in the 1920s, if you lived on a remote
homestead and someone broke their leg or fell
ill, the isolation could literally be a death
sentence. There were no phone lines. So how did
a pedal wireless solve that? I mean, just pedaling?
Traeger brilliantly combined a radio transmitter
with bicycle pedals. He realized that the biggest
hurdle in the outback wasn't just the radio signal.
It was generating the electricity to power the
radio. Oh, because they didn't have a power grid.
Exactly. So he hooked a generator up to a set
of pedals. You would sit there, physically pedal
like you were riding a bicycle to generate the
electrical wattage and use that power to transmit
a Morse code plea for a flying doctor. That is
the definition of rugged innovation. It truly
is. And tucked right in there alongside Flynn
and the pedal radio is College Harland. He was
a missionary who serviced the inland people,
and he's quite literally depicted riding a camel
across the note. Along with a compass printed
in the clear window with the rays number 20.
Yeah. If we connect this to the bigger picture,
Gary Emory's polymer design is telling a deeply
cohesive story. How so? While the old paper note
was about the theoretical physics of flight,
the 1994 polymer note is fundamentally about
grit and resilience. Oh, I see. It's about Mary
Reaby overcoming her past to build an empire.
It's about Flynn, Trager, and Harlan using medicine,
mechanical generators, and camels to bridge the
impossible deadly distances of the continent.
It's a brilliant narrative arc. But as the stories
printed on these notes became richer and more
detailed, the vault protecting them had to evolve
too. Because a beautiful note is useless if anyone
with a printer can copy it. Right. Which brings
us to the hidden defensive engineering of currency,
the invisible cat and mouse game. Counterfeiting
isn't just a nuisance. A flood of fake currency
can completely destabilize a nation's economy.
And the source material outlines exactly how
Australia's defensive measures had to aggressively
level up over the decades to stay ahead of international
crime syndicates. They had to. Let's look at
how analog the old paper era security used to
be. Their main defense was a watermark of Captain
James Cook hidden in the white space. Which,
funny enough, they actually just lazily borrowed
from the old pound notes. Yeah. Then, by 1976,
counterfeiting tech got better, so the bank retaliated
by weaving a metallic strip into the paper. It
started near the center and later moved to the
left side of the note. But when they made that
massive shift to polymer in 1994, the security
features went full sci -fi. Totally. Polymer
plastic itself is inherently much harder to source
and print on than paper. That immediately knocked
out the amateur counterfeiters. But the Reserve
Bank didn't stop there. They leaned into the
plastic aspect, right? Yeah, they utilized the
transparent nature of the plastic to create clear
windows. They added a shadow image of the national
coat of arms. And the tactile stuff too. Right.
They physically embossed the number 20 directly
into the clear plastic panel. So a blind person
or just someone checking their change in the
dark could physically feel it. That's so smart.
They even added fluorescent coloring to the serial
numbers and a special value patch that is completely
invisible until you expose it to ultraviolet
light. And we have to talk about the star feature.
This is the coolest piece of engineering on the
entire note, in my opinion. Oh, the star is incredible.
There is a circular pattern printed on the polymer,
but it's fractured. Four points of a star are
printed on the front of the note, and three points
of the star are printed on the back. And to the
naked eye, they just look like random chaotic
geometric shapes. Right, until you hold the note
up to a light source so you can see through the
plastic. Exactly. So what does this all mean?
When you hold it up to the light, The front and
back shapes align to form a flawless, perfectly
symmetrical seven -pointed star. It's amazing
precision. It's like cutting a complex QR code
in half, printing one half on a window in New
York, the other half on a window in London, and
requiring them to line up perfectly when you
look through them. This raises an important question
about the sheer scale of the invisible war between
national banks and counterfeiters. How do you
mean? Well, every single feature you just mentioned
requires a manufacturing process called intellioprinting.
It utilizes extreme pressures and simultaneous
front and back alignment. Oh, so it's not just
stamping it twice? No, not at all. If the printing
press shifts by even a fraction of a millimeter,
that star fails to align and the note is destroyed.
Wow. The bank is spending millions of dollars
to engineer physical architecture with printing
tolerances that are simply too mathematically
complex and expensive for a criminal enterprise
to replicate. And on top of all that, they still
have to ensure this high -tech fortress of a
note can survive being crumpled up in a wet swimsuit
or read perfectly by a vending machine optical
scanner. And that arms race never stops. Counterfeiters
get better computers. So the bank has to build
a better note. Which is why on October 9th, 2019,
they released the next generation twenty dollar
banknote. Right. They kept the exact same Clinton
red and orange lobster color mix to maintain
that psychological continuity we talked about
earlier. And they kept the characters of Mary
Reby and John Flynn, too. But they upgraded the
security to a whole new level. It features massive
clear top -to -bottom windows and dynamic color
-changing ink that actually shifts as you tilt
the bill. And they made one really specific historical
update in that 2019 release. They swapped out
Flynn's original plane. The old Victory biplane
was replaced with a highly detailed depiction
of a de Havilland Dragon Rapide airplane, specifically
shown taking off from a remote homestead in Broken
Hill. It's just this beautiful continuous polishing
of the story alongside the security. It really
is. It perfectly encapsulates the dual mandate
of modern currency. They are refining the historical
accuracy and the storytelling while simultaneously
upgrading the physics to make the note essentially
impossible to forge. So let's look at the incredible
journey this piece of currency has taken. We
started in 1966 with a simple color continuity
trick matching the old 10 pound note to comfort
a public that was terrified of decimalization.
Right, easing them in. Then it became a paper
tribute to the physics of flight and the golden
age of aviation. In 1994, it transformed into
a highly engineered polymer canvas, celebrating
the sheer rugged resilience of outback pioneers
and pedal -powered radios. And today, it's a
cutting -edge fortress of anti -counterfeiting
technology that still remembers to honor a missionary
riding a camel. It is a profound evolution for
an ob. Most people just shove into their pockets
without a second thought. Truly. Which is exactly
why I want to put a challenge out to you, the
listener. The next time you are handed a physical
$20 note, or honestly... any piece of physical
currency from anywhere in the world, don't just
instantly put it away. Take a second look. Yeah,
take a second look. Hold it up to the light and
look for that perfectly aligned star. Feel the
raised ink of the intaglio printing. Look for
the micro printing, the hidden physics equations,
or the tiny historical figures fighting for space
in the background. Spot the stories and the science
before you hand it over. And as you do that.
Here's a final thought to mull over. Let's hear
it. We've spent this entire deep dive exploring
the incredible physical art, the layered history
and the tactile engineering woven into these
polymer canvases. But as our society rapidly
shifts toward digital payments, Apple Pay and
tap and go cards, are we slowly losing this pocket
size medium for national storytelling? That's
a great point. Will the intricate, carefully
curated legacy of the lobster, with its harmonographs,
convicts turned magnates and hidden watermarks,
one day be replaced entirely by a sterile, invisible
line of code on a bank server? It really makes
you wonder, because that instant, frictionless
precision of a digital transaction is convenient.
But it certainly isn't as beautiful or as human
as the messy, dusty Clinton red history staring
back at us from the Candace right inside our
wallets.