Evening star., 1921-06-26

YITH the Philadelphia mint
NM again coming silver dol
Y lars. proposal that is
-. pending or at-least under
public discussion 'for the coinage of
d twn-eenf blece. and i: proposition
which was publicly put forward some
time ago that two-and- half piece
was needed in trade. it is intere sting
to recall tos.o4d-timers"-if indeed
they have forgotten-that several
kinds and denominations of metallic
|, money not met with now were oEce
current among US.
There have even been of late sug-
gestions that The United States coin
three. six and seven cent pieces. and
other odd and unusual coins. because
the penny. nickel. dime and quarter
do not altoSe ,her meet requirement nts.
One does not have 10 be old to re-
call the big copper two-cent piece.
two or three varieties of three-cent
pieces. the silver half-dime and the
twenty-cent pieces once in c.rcu u
tion. There were also the large cop
per pennies or "cart-wheel' pennies
and sthe white" pennies that our
Srandfathers or great-grandfat} t}l ers
used as money Many persons ar
st;ll living in the west. and very
likely a good MANY in the east. who
remember the fifty-dollar gold pieces.
or "slugs" that were minted in the
early days of California, and the
same persons will recall that tire re
were gold coins of such small de-
nominations as twenty-five and fifty
cents. These were exceedingly in
convenient to handle. and uncount-
able numbers were lost. Then. of
course. most of us remember the
one-dollar gold pieces, which did not
circulate very well as money in the
east. but which were in demand az
bangles" by young women, and were
Il popular form of Gift at Christmas
ard New Year
People in the south and east spoke
Of fps" bits" AND 'levies' as late
as the 10's though there were not
then in circulation coins representing
the denominations which those old
pieces Of money stood for. In news
paper advertisements. your graft
mother saw goods priced in fps s-d
bits and she, bought dress goods at
the memory of men stood for IsIs
cents and coin called "levy" was
in circulation in Maryland and Vir-
gnia in colonial times. The theory
is that the word came from con-
traction of the name of a coin called
an eleven -penny-bit" The coin was
age, and sometimes 1t circulated un-
der the name of a real and at 9TH
er times was called spanish shil
ling" Even though 1t, was called an
eleven -penny-hit" its value was one
eighth of dollar or 12l. cents.
nies.' and there was a fve-penny
coin in circulation in the colonies.
In colonial and early republican
days foreign coins had wide circu-
lation in the United States. Acts of
the legislatures of Maryland and vir-
mac Improvement Company to COL
lect tolls on the passage Of boats
through the cnnal around the Great
Falls of the Potomac set forth the
value in pounds. shillings and pence
sterling of the following coins then
and these were: Spanish milled
pieces of eight. English milled
crowns. French silver crowns. joan
mes. half-toannes moidores English
guineas. French guineas. doubloons.
Spanish pistoles. French milled pis-
toles and Arabian .chequins.
There has been great deal of con-
troversy over the origin of the word
"bit" in the west. Two bits" mean
ing quarter" is still heard in the
golden and the silver west; Four
iar.- In England and the American
colonies. and in the early years of.
the United States English four-penny
pieces and sixzpennN pieces were
called. 'four-nenny-bits" and six
pennv-b;ts." the word bit" carrying
the thought that they were pieces Of
small money Tho western word
bit seems to refer to coin that
was current in the West Indies and
Mexico and which was. no doubt, or
Snanish coinage. This "bit". seems to
have been worth 10 cents and to have
been succeeded by a coin. current in
Mexico. which was held to be worth
!2k cents in United States currency.
Probably it was the same coin which
shilling. A good many years ago:
when discussion of the meaning OF
bit g "two bits" a"d -four bits" had
one Of its periodical eruptions, an