Webster City freeman. [volume] (Webster City, Hamilton County, Iowa) 1884-1946, 1916-01-25
SECURES WILD
CAT CURRENCY
[. a. McMurray Obtains Possession
Of One Dollar Bill, of 1859
rs
Issue.


|cernment and has an enviable col
Election of coins and currency, has
within the past few days come into
possession Of the most priced of any
of his present collection. This is a
Isl bill of the wildcat" circulation
bearing the date Of April !, 1859.
1T was issued upon the Lyons City
Branch of the State Bank Of Iowa
when a member of the Rand family
was president and another member
cashier. 1t was also from a member
of this-one of the pioneer families
Iof Iowa-that Mr.. McMurray OBJ
Itained the rare bit of currency. The
| bank note is in excellent condition,
as crisp and new as if it had just
been issued, perceptibly of thinner
paper than the bank, notes Of the
present day and the engraving is ex-
quisitely DONE Shortly before the
death of Chas. Aldrich, while he was
yet curator of the State Historical
Society Of Iowa,x Mr.. McMurray was
in conversation with him concerning
this very wildcat currency" and
Expressed a desire to obtain some of
lit. Mr.. Aldrich said at that time
there was none of it upon exhibition
| in the historical building. There
may perhaps be some of it by this
time.
Digging about among ancient his
tory has been found the following
interesting bit of information con-
corning the part wild cat money had
to play in the early history OF Ham
ilton county Some time in the
spring of 1857, when Charles Aid
rich arrived in Webster City, a pub
lie meeting of citizens was held and
! it was resolved that If Mr.. Aldrich
should start paper, a guarantee of
five hundred subscribers and bonus
of $500 would be given, the bonus
to be paid when the printing Office
was equipped. In spite of the liber-
al offer, things looked very discour-
laying to the young editor. Times
We're very hard, prices were low and
money, which consisted mostly Of
wildcat currency was very uncer-
tain. But when he considered the
fact that Webster City was the coun-
ty seat, and had unusually fine agri-
cultural country to support it, he
knew the hard times could not last
always, and concluded to accept the
offer.
In this same vein, F. @. Lee, whose
manuscripts furnished most Of the
copy for the history of Hamilton
county, has written a brief chapter
upon this queer species OF currency
which will be of interest to many:
Most of the settlers were poor
men who brought little, if any more
money with them than enough to
pay the entry fee for their lands.
They had no market for their pro-
duce except to newcomers, and there
We're no fixed prices for anything,
unless the product was very scarce.
The price was very low and money
was SO scarce that when one had
anything to sell he usually had to
trade for something he needed worse
that what he had to dispose of. What
made this condition infinitely worse,
was the great financial panic OF
1857 which broke nearly all the
banks and filled the country with
worthless bank bills. The law under
which this money was issued provid-
ed that 1t should have a specie basis
and the affidavit of the banker issu-
ing the bills was taken as proof of
the fact that the specie was on hand
when the bills were issued. Strange
ly enough, the law did not provide
that the specie should be kept ON
hand, or If it did, the provision was
not obeyed, so the specie basis that
lid duty in starting one bank and
,ased the conscience of the banker
,ver the affidavite he made, was
,arted off to the next town and be-
,ame the specie basis for another
,ank, and so it travelled round the
country starting wild cat banks.
The bills promised to pay gold or
liver on demand, but as paper \
money was so much more conven-
ent than coin, few people demand
ID coin and having confidence that
he coin was behind the bills for II
heir redemption, the bills We're II
eadily taken and did all the offices I
f money. If the fraud had not been
discovered, this money might have s
,one ON doing the business OF the I
ountry as perfectly as any money I
Guild have done. So long as a man D
bought the bank had the coin in c
IS vaults to redeem the bill he had a
a his pocket he did not want the a
ill redeemed-he preferred the pa $