Evening journal., 1913-08-18
NEW NEWS OF YESTERDAY
The Small Intrinsic Value
Of the PreSent-Day
Copper Cent
BY Holland.

Can you remember when the first
cent Of the small size Characteristic
Of the kind now in circulation was
minted and pur into circulation by
the United States government" ask
ed the late John Thompson, who was
one Of the originators Of our national
banking system and who was widely
known throughout the Uni'ed States
for thirty years before the national
bank law was passed as the prophet
or Of Thompson's Bank Note Report
er-of me year or two before his
death in the early nineties.
/ told Mr.. Thompson that had a
faint recollection of having seen, in
my boyhood days, some one show
what he called the new cent which
had just come from the mint
well, do you remember the old
big copper cents, which were in size
nearly as large as a silver helf-dol-
lar?" Mr.. Thompson asked me-
said in reply that / remembered
them very we'll
We'll now" said Mr.. Thompson.
81 viii tell you an interesting story
about the manner In which the coin
ing Of these great copper cents was
abandoned and the little cent now
in general circulation was adopted in
place of them.
"The government made a great
deal Of money, or somebody did out
Of the coinage of the copper cents.
They we're intrinsically worth a good
deal less than their face value My
recollection Is that they we're legal
tender up to FIVE dollars They we're
redeemable at sub-treasuries, but as
the sub-treasuries were few and far
between. and as an enormous amount
Of these big copper cents we're coined
and put into circulation. some of
them dating way back almost TO the
beginning Of the century. the result
was that millions of these cents we're
in use.
ut used to be the custom Of store
keepers. especially the proprietors OF
country stores, all over the country
10 deposit their surplus of cents in
convenient nail kegs. They found
that their local banks did not like to
receive on deposit more than 500 of
these cents at a time The result was
that in The course of a year every
storekeeper IN the United States, who
was solvent found that he had two
or three perhaps more, nail keys
filled with copper cents. So when the
amount was large enough he was ac-
customed to ship them to New York
or other large financial centres, so
that he could get silver specie in ex-
change for them.
81 was talking one day with a gem
tleman who kept a store in eastern
Connecticut. and he told me that IL
was not unusual for him to send once
year several kegs filled with big
copper cents to New York so that he
could get actual silver for them.
said to him that If the government
would coin a small cent, little larger
in diameter than a silver dime, every
body would Just as willingly take the
small cent as the big one and an inn
mense amount OF inconvenience would
be ended.
"He thought the idea a good one
and we put our heads together and
started a correspondence with a view
to the abandonment of the coinage OF
large copper cents and the substitu-
ton of the little ones for them. About
that time copper was becoming more
valuable in industry. and that fact
appealed to the authorities.
"The coinage Of the new cent was
authorized. but I don't suppose that
one person in a thousand realizes
that there is less than one-tenth of
/ per cent of real value In the copper
which is contained in the small coin,
! huf tho euhetftutf0n of tho small coin
/ for the big one was welcomed by peo-
Copyright, 1918. by E. ]. Edwards
All rights reserved.)
Tomorrow Mr. Edwards will tell oi
ing Systm."