The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1908-09-13
SPURIOUS COIN A. LURE.
of Counterfeiting a Puzzle
to Authorities.

"Like the fly which lights on paper
carefully smeared with molasses for his
benefit, the man who lets his thoughts
dwell upon queer money is caught
hard and fast, unless he gets the idea
out of his head as soon as it enters .
That is the psychology sof counterfeit
ing, as explained by Captain Thomas
J. Porter of the United States secret
service, to the Chicago Record Herald
AS a further illustration of his
theory, Captain Porter reverted to the
case of the Rev. James r. Kaye, the
Oak Park minister, convicted of max
ing bad coin.
"Men who counterfeit want to get
rich quickly" explained Captain
Porter. 1T is funny, though, how the
game attracts a man who is otherwise
honest. The man who is attracted at
first by the prospect of making money
easily in this way argues that he Is
doing no wrong.
He simply says to himself that he
win make a few thousand dollars of
Spurious money anu LAeA suohE IL Uat
in safe way. He argues with himself
that the money win be accepted by
every one, and that it really is the
same as the money stamped as legal
tender by the government, and only the
government viii lose.
''He begins to read about counter
feiting, the more he reads the easier the
thing seems. Ten to one he has a taste
for mechanics and any man With
simple knowledge of metals, If he has
the proper dies, can turn out pretty
fair representation of a dollar or other
silver coin.
Most of the oldtime eounterfeiters
have gone out of business or are serv-
ing terms in penitentiaries, and many
of the spurious coins made at the pre-
sent time are manufactured by men
who are respected in the communities
IN which they live.
Counterfeiting banknotes is more
difficult than making spurious coins, but
after a man has been successful with
silver pieces he takes up the other, and,
with study and perseverance, can turn
out few bills. However, these makers
of bad money never last long. They
are run TO earth sooner or later. Then
comes their realization of the crime
they have been involved in. The
government is a relentless enemy and
the punishment for making spurious
money is severe, but the wrongdoers
never realize this until they are fairly
caught.
Every man believes IN his own
heart that he is sharper and shrewder
than his neighbor. When he reads
stories of counterfeiters who fiourished
years ago he sees what biunders they
made and how they came to be caught.
g / can do better than that fellow
did, and those dub detectives could /
never have caught me in the trap they
laid for him, is the way the amateur
muses.. He figures IT all |
put to his own satisfaction, but he fails |
to give the men in Uncle Sam s serviee |
credit for any brain or originality of |
hought He thinks that they work the |
same way on every case, and that all |
ne has to do is to observe the pitfalls |
hat the other men fell into and be |
careful not to walk into them himself. |
sfThis point settled, the deluded /
7ictim of the get-rieh-quick craze has 1
,nly a few more steps to take. The
irst thing, that he does, generally, Is I
o manufacture some homemade dies Of
,laster of paris. They are crude molds
# silver pieces, and so onr deluded
riend experiments little by pouring
,ure lead into these casts, and to his
urprise and delight he turns out few
,ieces of metal which pear 3 resem-
dance to money