The San Francisco call., 1906-06-03

The basis of it is the little penny. I'm
like people. the penny does not change.
Wher your clothes are dilapidated and
you grow thin and pinched and bad luck
stamps sorrow on your face, you get snub-
bed right and left and only few friends,
tried and true. stand by you.
But the little copper cent, no matter
how moldy, battered, greasy and begrimed
it may be, goes for its full face value and
a hundred of the meanest looking coppers
you ever saw will get you a beautiful,
brand new dollar bill at the bank or the
Sub-Treasury. with the greatest govern
ment in the world at the back of it and
the pictures of your favorite statesmen
who have saved the country so many
times smiling at you as YOU fold the crisp
note and tuck it away in your pocket
book.
Great is the power of the penny. If you
don't believe it, ask the Aladdins who own
the subway and the department stores
of New York and frequently visit San
Francisco
All day long men file into the small
change department of the Sub Treasury
with valises filled with pennies. Usually
the load is about all they can carry 1t is
curious how pennies disappear during
winter seasons and come out of their
hiding places and go to the Sub Treasury
when the summer months arrive. AS
business slackens out come the copper
cents to be exchanged for bills and larger
coins. As Thanksgiving and Christmas
draw near the demand for pennies in
creases until there is a scarcity of the
humble coin. Last season, just before the
holidays, a single department store in
New York gave a standing order for 100,-
900 pennies to be delivered every Monday
morning
According to the New York Sub-Treas-
ury figures an average of one and a half
million of pennies is received over the
counter a week Six million six hundred
thousand pennies, weighing 1920 pounds,
is the record there a month. Until recent
ly the tradition extending back to the
good old days of Alexander Hamilton re-
quired all coins to be counted by hand,
and yet it is impossible for any human
being to count money without making
now and then an error.
When counting machines were invented
even the banks were slow to patronize
them. and for a time the Government
would not accept machine counted money.
An odd thing about this kind of money
is that any one should attempt to counter
felt SO. insignificant a coin as a copper
cent. the baby coin of all the money in
America. Yet there are men in the peni-
tertiary for initiating the Government
coppers The counterfeits were made of
the real stuff, and it was imagined that
no one would hesitate to take copper
money. So a lot of it was put into circu-
lation, Notwithstanding the Indian head
was poorly executed
The Government detectives were awake,
however. and did take the trouble to in
vestigate the penny counterfeiters, who
were duly convicted and sent to prison.
As pound of copper costs only 16 cents
and you can make hundred and thirty
pennies out of it. the industry was con-
sidered quite profitable by. the counter
feiters until they were put in Jail.
1t is getting 10 be a fashion for big
city concerns which do business with the
public to reduce expenses for bookkeepers
and cashiers and make the public drop
pennies and nickels into slots, buy tickets