Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1903-12-19
MAKING CURRENCY.
MANY Visitors to Uncle Sans
Mammoth Bureau.
How The New Currency Impresses
Callers.
An Officials Odd Experience in Eek.
changing Bills.

| washington, dec. lS.-AI no time IN
its history has the work of the national
bureau of engraving and printing been
las active as it is at present. 1t is in
Icreasing rapidly and of course as the
country expands in area and COM
lmercial greatness so will the operations
of providing United States notes, GER
ticates of deposit, bonds, internal rev.
enuc stamps, postage stamps, custom
II stamps and SO forth and so on expand
correspondingly Work is going on
night and day. 1t perforce must keep
growth with the demands of the coun-
try.
| At this particular date there are ex-
actiy 1920 people on the employees
rolls of the bureau. OF these, 1913 are
| men and 1902 women, and of them
Gl5 are plate printers and apprentices
and 100 (au of whom are young wo-
men) are printers assistants. The
force employed at night foots up 210,
but the indications are that there will
have to be an increase and also addi-
tional buildings as the months move
on, for the demands for new money
handed in by the treasurer of the
United States are constantly becoming
greater.
TIE engravers and pressmen ard
their assistants. in addition to turning
out American notes and securities OF
all kinds, are giving much attention to
the benighted ones in LuZon and the
nearly. if not quite, TOO other islands
of the Philippine archipelago. Ship
ments of notes are being made to Ma
pil9 nj vary ratrlIl1r intervals
This Philippine money is in notes of
one, two, five and ten pesos. A peso
is valued at about so cents in the cur
rency of this country, and of these
notes used in our Asiatic possessions
there is something that appears para
doxical The currency is and yet is
not United States currency.
1t might have value in commercial
quarters somewhat akin to Canadian
moneys and the same value in foreign
| lands, but it is not United States mon
| ey. 1t is prescribed by the govern
ment for use in it's own territory but
on the main land it is of little good be-
yond what attaches to it as a curio.
| Possibly, so some Of the treasury
folks think, the time will come when
the Philippine peso note Will. with its
United States frank upon it, be as good
anywhere Oh the vast American conti-
nent as it is within the wide domain Of
| the Island of LuZOn.
The Philippine postage stamp is, and
| has for some time been, in active oper-
| alton in that far-on Pacific ocean re-
! gion of ours. It is no stranger to the
people of this country and has the ap-
pcarance of an ordinary United States
h stamp except that it carries impressed
upon it the word Philippines.
\ There are. however, not sufficiency
L Of those Stamps in readiness for the
permanent and temporary residents in
II the Philippines. but there soon will be,
| and then the chances are that the or
binary United States stamps will not
be used on the islands.
The bureau OF engraving is decidedly
la Mecca of the hundreds of pilgrims
;who constantly enter the widc-open
gates of the capital by every train from
Everywhere that enters the city scores
Iof times each day.
People from all parts Of the country
want to know how the government
money is made and when they step
within the red brick walls of the bu-
rcau building and secure one Of the
office guides they have a list of qucs-
tons ready to present as long as the
moral law and the proper officials are
neither slow nor discourteous in giving
them all possible information.
They are told how the plates are
made: First, there are the dies manu-
featured on soft steel, then these are
formed into a roll and from that roll
the plates are made, from which the
notes from the ordinary 81 greenback
to the amazing gold $4,000 yellow
face and back, too-and no bigger than
the 81 note-are made.
They are informed, also, that about
once in every year committee is APP
pointed by the Secretary Of the Treas
ury that condemns such plates as is
necessary to condemn: how these are
boiled down or melted. or go through
some kind of a process at the navy
yard furnace shops and are rendered
into a mass of old iron or steel or
something: ard, after having by the
magic Of their power at one time been
instrumental in perfectlng those prec-
ious notes which bring both happiness
and wretchedness into the world,
though shorn of their greatness in this
respect and relegated to baser uses.
have not yet lost all character.
They may yet be part of material
used in casting great cannon or per-
haps become an item in the construc-
ton of big warshlp.
| All this, of course, is very instructive
to the pilgrims. They listen with
open-mouthed wonder and feel con-
WINGED that they know great deal OF
how their Uncle Sam makes the money.
a part of which comes now and then
into their possession. and will relate it
to their friends when they reach their
respective homes, which are scattered
everywhere along the continent from
Maine to California, and from the
Atlantic to the Pacific coasts.