Perth Amboy evening news., 1904-06-24
PULP OF %BANKNOTES.
RETIRED BILLS ARE TO BE MORE
THOROUGHLY MACEHATED.
Tor the Reason That Pieces of Notes
Taken from Pulp Have Been
Presented for Redemp-
ton.

ton.
Through an order promulgated by the
treasurer OF the United States, the old
macerating machine in the ~sub-base-
ment of the treasury, at Washington,
has been put out of commission, and
hereafter all paper money, whether is
sued by the government or by national
banks, will be reduced 10 pulp in the
large macerator at the bureau of en-
craving and printing.
This order, says the New York Trib-
une, was brought about by a protest
made by national bankers claiming that
the old machine failed to Go its work
perfectly, and that the bank-notes
dumped into it not infrequently turned
up in sections for redemption by the
banks of issue; that the pulp sold to va
rious makers and manufacturers of i'm
ages, to be resold as souvenirs, was
filled with large pieces of bills, and that
these were picked from the pulp images
and offered for redemption. Notwith-
standing the fact that the treasury mac
orator has been in service for many
years, and has reduced to pulp many tril-
lions of dollars in bank-notes which had
ceased to be current, this complaint was
the first n ever made against its non
performance of duty, but the treasurer
got such positive evidence that the
bankers were correct in their assertions
that he issued the order.
Washington souvenir dealers have
long realized that the pulp images found
a heavier demand than any other, and
those made from the pulp Of the notes
last destroyed-or partly so, by the
treasury macerator have always brought
a higher price than the ones manufac-
tured from the pulp of the macerator at
the bureau of engraving and printing,
this being due entirely to the fact that
images from the latter contain not a
speck of greenbacks, the notes being re-
duced to almost a whitish pulp. Nat
urally, visitors prefer ar image made
from real money" In which some of the
money would be in evidence. The treas
ury maeerator production, or output,
was, therefore. worth a great deal more
to the manufacturers, and always
brought a much larger price. In fact,
the bureaus pulp was almost a drug on
the market.
But now the images-busts of presi-
dents, the Washington monument, Uncle
Sans hat, the national emblem, the
eagle, the capitol, the treasury, cats,
dogs, frogs. etc, each representing from
$4,000 to SIS, 000-must be made from
the bureau pulp, or a f1rst-class counter
felt, for every note destroyed must be
In this specially constructed macerator,
which works every day and night In the
year except Sunday. there being from
81 500, 900 to 81, 900, 600 macerated every
"a hours. This work of maceration and
the preparation for 1t are under the per-
sonal direction of representatives Of the
treasurer, the secretary, the comptroller
AID The register, and these representa-
tives go with the heavily guarded wagon
containing the money to the bureau,
where II is taken from the steel boxes,
checked off. placed In the macerator, the
iron doors closed, locked and sealed,
anu tuSh TIC AldCliHC DCBluS u WIN
of destruction. The large boiler or vat
in which the money is placed is filled
with some kind of chemicals and a net
work of machinery keeps up a continu-
GUS churning and grinding until IL
o'clock the following day, when 1t is
stopped, the pulp taken out, and n
other million or two placed in, to be
treated in the same way for the next "a
hours.
BY this process of m%aceration 1t is ut
terly impossible for anyone to find any
evidences of money in the pulp, even
the small silk threads which Il
through all genuine notes being entirely
whitish pulp.
With the issuing of the order by the
treasurer there are walls and weepingG
by a score of old soldiers who have been
manufacturing these pulp images. They
feel that their occupation is gone, and
that sure starvation stares them in the
face IL compelled to use the bureau pulp,
but some of the dealers express the be-
lief that business in the pulp image line
will move along as usual, because, as one
expressed it. there will not be much diff
Guilty in catching on to the fact that it
Is not hard work to pinch off a small
portion of a bill and stick it on the i'm
age, hundreds of them being easily doc
tored In this way in a short time. Should
Chief Wilkie or some of his men catch
up with manufacturers Dr. dealers mu-
~tllating bills in this way to make images
salable, another chapter would be added.