The Black Hills union and western stock review. [volume] (Rapid City, S.D.) 1904-19??, 1910-03-18
THE Weight OF money
Do You Think You Could Lift a
Fortune In Silver Coins7
If you DO you ARE MISTAKEN

Two Hundred Pounds Of Quarters
Would Give You Only $s,es7, WhiIs
the Same Weight Of Gold Would
Give 4,oso-Wsisht Of Paper Money
II wish had all the money could
lift" How many Of the thousands
who make this get-rich-quick wish
have any idea Of the amount they
would have IL the wish should be
granted. Few name the denomination
Of the money on which they desire to
test their strength, perhaps believing
that their lifting powers would make
them wealthy no matter what kind of
money they lifted.
If they We're asked how much they
could lift In silver or small bills the
majority probably would name some
fabulous sum which investigation
would show several men could not
bulge. In gold or in paper money Of
large denominations the ordinary In
dividual would be able to lift fair
sized fortune, but to win a million by
lifting it in anything less than twenty
dollar bills would need the strength
Of veritable Sandow.
An official Of the subtreasury who Is
interested in odd statistics in his de-
partment was asked how much money
the average man could lift in the vari-
GUS denominations Of gold, silver and
paper.
Well" he replied, "a man could
make money on that proposition IL he
could get hold of paper money Of large
denominations, but on the smaller bills,
silver and gold he would not be
millionaire by any means.
'The weight Of money Is very de-
ceptlve. For instance. young man.
a friend of mine. came in to see me
one day with his fiancee. l was show
Ing them through my department and
asked my friend If he thought the
young woman was worth her weight
In gold. He did think SO, most emphat-
ically, and after ascertaining that her
weight was one 1O7 pounds we fig
ured that she would be worth In gold
coin exactly s2s,647. Her fiancee
thought that would be pretty cheap.
Perhaps more people are deceived
on the weight of paper money than on
the metals Now, how many one dol
lar bills do you think would be neces-
sary to weigh as much as five dol
lar gold piece?"
Fifty was >ventured as a guess, and
the statistician laughed.
II have had guesses on that all the
way from 90 to 5OO," he said, "and
some of them from men who have
handled money for years. AS mat
ter Of fact, with five dollar gold
piece In one scale you would have to
put about six and half bills In the
other to balance it,
He produced figures to prove that q
I'VE dollar gold piece weighed two
hundred and ninety-six thousandths of
an ounce avoirdupois. An employee
who makes the new bills up in pack
ages of 100 each said that hundred
bills weighed four and one half ounces.
That would make one bill weigh forty
i've thOusandths Of nm ounce, and be-
tween six and seven would balance
the gold piece.
Figures on the lifting proposition
were furnished from the department
where the money is weighed In bags
as standards. The standard amount
for gold coin. 5000. weighs eighteen
and half pounds. Five hundred sill
yer dollars weigh thirty-five and half
pounds, and $500 in half dollars, or
400 coins. weighs eleven pounds. TAX
Ing 200 pounds as gold lift for an
average man. these results were OBJ
tained: