Mary Seacole On New £50 Note?

[Zacs-Master]

What are your thoughts about Mary Seacole appearing on the new £50 note?
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/new-50-pound-note-polymer-black-british-woman-currency-campaign-a8582466.html

Apparently the choice will be put to the public:
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/news/2018/october/bank-confirms-plans-for-new-50-note.pdf?la=en&hash=5DFBFFDB0EE60637628781155FC67F06F919722B

[jackthehat]

A worthy contender....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace

[goodgoalie]

Great suggestion, jack. And it fits with having someone not so well known on the £50, like Houblon

[jeanette100]

Brilliant, and there are many more who deserve a place.....Tilly Shilling who was an amazing engineer in the war, saved pilots lives by changing the spitfire engine: Mary Wollstonecraft who pioneered women's education in the 1700s; Helen Bamber who worked with child survivors in the Holocaust; Margaret Damer-Dawson who founded the Womens Police Service; Caroline Harriet Haslett, an electrical engineer and campaigner............so many and so few bank notes.

[mushroom25]

all worthy contenders JtH and Jeanette, but none tick the "diversity" box.

[bednobs]

i have never touched a £50 note in my life, so i couldnt care either way

[jourdain2]

As others have said, there are a few question-marks about Mary Seacole - worthy though her efforts were, she was a business-woman. I would think Edith Cavell should be a major contender, she lost her life for her country after all, out of a sense of duty.

[dannyk13]

Agree about Edith Cavell also what about Violette Szabo.

[cassa333]

Never heard of her but as long as whoever it is isn’t a paedophile, murderer or general bad person I don’t really care who is on the notes.

[anotheoldgit]

We do not need a £50 note, hardly anyone uses cash anyway.

Unless it's tradesmen who prefer 'cash in hand', for some reason.

[jourdain2]

Yes, Violette Szabo is another courageous and worthy woman.

[anotheoldgit]

jourdain2

In the name of diversity there have also been some courageous and worthy men.

[jourdain2]

Not arguing about that AOG - that list would be huge. The thread seems to be about a suitable female candidate, however, so I responded in kind.

[Zacs-Master]

We haven’t seen the list. Maybe there are men on there too but as ‘the folding stuff’ has tended to be dominated by men, therefore, to diversify, a woman may well be chosen.

[THECORBYLOON]

ANOTHEOLDGIT, there's £68,899,000,000 in banknotes in circulation so there must be a fair few folk using them.

[Zacs-Master]

Nah, they’re all under folk’s mattresses.

[jackthehat]

£1 - Sir Isaac Newton
£5 - Duke of Wellington; George Stephenson; Elizabeth Fry; Winston Churchill
£10 - Florence Nightingale; Charles Dickens; Charles Darwin; Jane Austen
£20 - William Shakespeare; Michael Faraday; Sir Edward Elgar; Adam Smith; (JMW Turner - in 2020)
£50 - Sir Christopher Wren; Sir John Houblon; James Watt & Matthew Boulton;

Seems like the balance has been firmly in the favour of 'noteworthy' men....

[Zacs-Master]

‘Noteworthy’. Love it. BA, JTH.

[Spicerack]

You've forgotten the Queen, jack.

[jno]

limited sympathy for Cavell: medical staff are meant to be non-partisan. When they start smuggling soldiers out, they endanger all medical staff. Some historians think she was a spy, too.

[Fatalbertfixer]

Thank you Spicerack,I was going to mention that a woman has been on every bank note since the 1950's.