The Cordova daily times., 1922-01-11

IS alWayS interesting. And no story of money is more in- teresting than it's transition from the days of '49 to the present San Fran cisco.
 No chapter in California's early TO- mantle days of the gold lure is more, fascinating than those of San Fran cisco's Anglo-Saxon rebirth, when banks and financial bourses issued their own money and a government thousands of miles away in distance and many months in time complacent- ly permitted the practice. San Francisco still makes her own money, but now in a United States mint which has coined close to $3,- O0O,OOOOOO in domestic and foreign pieces since it was established and carries something like 4SO,000,000 in it's vaults. Just now this money fac tory of Uncle Sam is running night and day turning out 260,00o silver dol
 
 For years San Francisco had it's own way of doing business, of incur ting debts and settling them, of hand ling coin and gold dust and computing values and of deifying gold and scorn- ing copper and nickel" said J. Leland Steinman, secretary of the Pacific Coast Numismatic Society, recently, discussing the, early and romantic gold days Because of it's remoteness and the astonishing character of it's first years of growth, San Francisco was by no means flush of current coin in it's pioneer days. Previous to the dis covery of gold and the consequent rapid influx of population there was little. coin in circulation in California and that little in the towns of Mon terey. San Diego and Los Angeles.
 Payments throughout the country were frequently made in cattle. hides and farm products.
 with it's Mexican memories it was natural that California should retain many of it's old tokens of associations, and it so happened after the seces- sion Mexican doubloons or ounces and Mexican pesos or pillar dollars were the principal coins in use. 'The original value of the doubloon was $16, but in San Francisco it was received for $1575. After the discov- cry of gold that metal in it's natural state became the currency. Gold dust was the common form in which it was dealt in, and in 184S and 1S49 the bankers rates were:
 "For grain dust, $15.50 to S15.75 an ounce.
 "Quick-silver dust, $1450 to $14.75 an ounce.
 "This was when coin was paid for the dust When the banks received it on deposite they valued it at $16 an ounce and repaid it at the same rate.
 "Everything was gold. There was actually more of it than people knew what to do with Bags of gold dust were handed about as freely as cake. The gamblers at the public saloons used them as stakes and guessed at the weight. Men had sublime indiffer- ence to the smaller coins and talked indifferently of dust and dollars There was nothing less received for any service, however slight, than dollar; for any article, however trifiing, than twenty-five cents.
 'The smaller silver coins of what ever denominations and of every country were all alike bits and passed i for the same value. AS for copper money, it was curiosity and had no value, this kind of money being sup posed to cause hard luck fer its owner
 With gold matters were quite diff ferent. Dust continued to be plenti- full, but coin continued to be scarce. Finally the banks took hold, and as the only way to settle the difficulty began the coinage of private gold.
 "There were fully fifteen private hints in California which operated from 1849 up to and including 1855. Numerous varieties of private issues,