Arizona silver belt., 1896-07-09
THE PENNY IS POPULAR.
Our Smallest Coin Is in Great De-
 mand in Business.
Bargain Counters Ia Department Stores Have Done Much to Make the Coppers Necesssry-An Important Pur-
 chasing Power.

The 1-cent copper coin of the United States is enjoying an increased popular demand. It is a significant fact that the coinage of this piece has of very recent years taken up more of the time of the Philadelphia mint than ever before. Three presses are now at work there on copper coinage, turning out l50,000 cents day. This rate has before been equaled or exceeded, but 1t is worthy of remark now in view of the previous great output of the copper coins within the past dozen years, Since the foundation of the mint in l793 i,066,677,5 sos one-cent pieces have been struck, and it is estimated that some 7S0.000,000 pieces are now outstanding.
 But the great bulk of this coinage has taken place lately. From l793 to the beginning of the civil war the coin age of the cent piece did not average much above S25,OO0 worth n year, or 2,j00,o00 pieces. Just prior to and dur ing the war the coinage became un- usually large, but fell off during the time of inflated prices to a marked ex- tent. But in 1880 the penny coinage rose suddenly to an unusually high figure, and has kept there ever since. Within the past IS years almost one. half of the entire penny coinage of the whole country has been executed. Of the amount outstanding of 7SO,0OO,O0o pieces, no less than 5O4, 100000 pieces have been struck in the IS years. And the public demand for the coin appears to be unabated and rather on the in- crease.
 The explanation of this is doubtless 10 be found in the more general prac- tice of cash payments in the retail trade and the great fall in prices which has come about in the past 20 years. Not long ago the smallest coin known in the general circulation west of the Mississippi river was the nickel scent piece. Only within a few days the larger St. Louis papers were charging : cents copy for their issues, when } cents, 9 cents and even cent were the prevailing rates farther east. Now pa pers costing only the fraction of nickel are the rule rather than the eX. ception in the west. The growth of the country and the competition in business would of themselves finally bring the cent into active use theret but the downward course of prices has operated all over the country tO make it much more active coin than ever before. Odd prices are now frequent even where purchases are for round amounts or considerable sums. Penny bargain counters in some of the big de- pertinent stores have lately been intro duced. A Scent street car fare is not unknown; and no doubt is to become better known.
 In fact. so closely is the trade of the country calculating its prices that de- mand may not be far off for the rein troduction of the half-cent piece. FrG.,- tional parts of cent are now very common in even retail quotations. England finds use for such a coin in the bronze farthing. France in the sou, which is, however, more nearly the value of cent than half-cent. Our own coinage laws have authorized the coinage of a half-cent piece, and from 1793 to 1911 a large number of these pieces were struck. At two other pe- riods before the war there was some coinage of this coin; but in 1857 it was discontinued, and has not been since revived. The 2-cent piece was dropped in 1873, and the Scent piece in 1890.
 The growing importance of the penny or. more properly, the cent, has an important bearing on the economy of the people. It gives to the nickel, the dime, and all pieces of money a higher value in the eye of the Cossessor than they had before, and teaches care in all expenditures. No one now needs to feel ashamed to wait at the store for the change to be brought back amounting to only cent. That penny has come to possess an important pur- chasing power, greater than it has ever had before. And it is in the way of be- ing advanced to second place above the lowest in the divisions of the monetary eirculation.--Springfield (Mass.) Re- publican.