thumb|300px|Series 1880 Ninger drawn $100 Legal Tender Note, attributed to Emanuel Ninger ([[National Museum of American History)]]
thumb|300px|Series 1880 genuine $100 Legal Tender Note.
Emanuel Ninger (1846/1847 – July 25, 1924), known as "Jim the Penman", was a counterfeiter in the late 1880s.
Biography
Ninger and his wife, Adelaide, arrived c. 1876 from Germany to live in Hoboken, New Jersey. He worked as a sign painter and then bought a farm in Westfield, New Jersey. He told his neighbors that he was receiving a pension from the Prussian army. On October 12, 1892 he moved to Flagtown, New Jersey.
Forgery
thumb|right|250px|A Ninger bill, seized in 1896.
Ninger began counterfeiting in 1878, Not having any clues as to Ninger's identity, he was named "Jim the Penman" by the Secret Service. Beginning with a $10 bill, he moved on to $20s and $50s, and later $100s. He used a camel’s hair brush to put colors on the note, imitated the silk threads with red and blue inks, and suggested rather than duplicated the intricate geometric lathework.
He worked for weeks at a time on each note, and this was profitable because at the time one of those notes was extremely valuable (about $2,000 or $4,000 in today's dollars).<!--He gained a following, as the invariably wealthy people that ended up with these banknotes tended to realize their worth as works of art.-->
He was apprehended by the United States Secret Service in March 1896 when he paid a bartender with a $50 banknote, the note got wet, and the ink began to smudge. and was sentenced on May 29, 1896 to six years in the Erie County Penitentiary. At some point after his release he forged a few British pound notes.