Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1916-03-03

S9 ONE building during the year
J: J: !:
E1P1 ending June 80. 1915, Uncle Sam
LII Ia made thirty and a half billion dollars
M ~ This money factory is called the bu-
I'M III reau of engraving and printing
% S& Uncle Sam is the head of the corpo-
E@sJ ration which is actively engaged in
the production of wealth. and he has
with him as other members of the
urn ABOUT one hundred million nephews and
nieces
inns governmental factory produces paper
money, bonds, revenue postage and custom
stamps checks, drafts and all the important docu-
menus printed from engraved plates. The direc-
tor OF the bureau of engraving and printing ia
Joseph ID. Ralph. He might be called the foreman
OF the greatest money-making shop in the United
States OF America and perhaps in the world.
From Director Ralphs own words we learn some
thins@pecifc about the activities of this big shop
of the capital city:
"The daily output of United States notes. gold
and silver certificates and national bank notes. is
two and one-quarter million notes. having a face
vaiue or nine million dollars and weighing over
three and half tons. II laid out fiat they would
cover nine acres. and If placed end to end the
daily output would make chain two hundred and
fifty miles long.
Each day forty million postage stamps are
manufactured, which would cover approximately
seven acres, or make chain of stamps six hun
dred and twenty miles long The value of each
days stamp output is nearly seven hundred and
nifty uhouSduu uolldTS DIX uunureQ employees
engaged In stamp manufacture. Fiftyone different
kinds Of postage stamps, in denominations from
one cent to five dollars, made for the United
States and its insular possessions. They are print
ed in fifteen distinctive colors.
Another important part of the bureaus work
Is internal revenue stamps, through which an an
nual income of five hundred million dollars is
collected for Uncle Sam These stamps are of
larger size than postage stamps, and while the
daily output is only twenty million stamps, they
would cover twenty acres If spread out in single
sheets, and they weigh six and half tons More
than three hundred different varieties are issued"
In Uncle Sans workshop is made all the paper
money for the United States government This
means that every man who has dollar bill in his
hand, or who is lucky enough to have a bill of
larger denomination, may know of certainty
that its origin in factory situated at the
corner of Fourteenth and streets, S. W.. in the
city of Washington d. c.
And speaking of counterfets, there is a thing
of marked interest which might be said The
bureau of engraving and printing was organized
under act of July H. 1852. From that day to
this the government has done its work. 1t
has employed the most skillful engravers that it
can find and It is a matter of pride today to this
government that never in the history of the bu-
ireau has of its employees been engaged in the
work of counterfeitng. 1t is true that counter
lfeiting goes occasionally in different places
throughout the United States, but in the hundreds
"
women engaged in the work, not one ever had
been in the employment of the government, and
not one was found to be in collision with any OF
Uncle Sans workmen. r
Concerning the matter of engraving Director
Ralph of the bureau has had this to say:j
1.-THE engraving division Is the corner stone Of
the bureau and the bulwark OF our securities. In
this division every form Of security has its origin
and the most artistic and skilled engravers that
the world produces employed here.
Steel engraving is the perfection Of art as ap-
pIied to securities 1t differs from painting and
sculpturing, inasmuch as the engraver who carves
mis- work on steel plates must deliberately study
the effect OF each infinitesimal line. Free hand,
With . diamond pointed tool. known as graver.
aided by q powerful magnfyng glass, he carves
away conscious that one false cut or slip Of his
tool or miscalculation of depth or width of line
viii destroy the artistic merit of his creation.
and weeks or months of labor will have been in
vain.