Salt Lake Telegram | 1938-11-23 | Page 16 | Strange as it Seems

STRANGE AS IT SEEMS SEE S R By John Hix FooT S1 CANDLE l rl r- r AND wl l s A YEAR I L y i Made by f 3 WINf NAPE A L DoMI cA eD OVER yI ARs IM eX ilis pu u I f MAINE AND A No I 0 c C 0 r RUSSIAN PEASANTS foR COOKING MEWS I ITi Ti EI CON IP R P 1 METAL t e eS ii S 1 1 9 PLATINUM I UTENSILS Strange as it seems Russi Russian n peasants at one time made cooking pots and pans from platinum a metal which today is worth five times as much as gold Early in the nineteenth century platinum was discovered in Russia but full realization of its value was not to come until later years Commonplace Commonplace Commonplace Com Com- articles were made from it buckles snuffboxes and even cooking cooking cooking cook cook- ing utensils Believed to have been discovered first in South America by early Spanish explorers the metal came into ill repute in that country when it was used in making counterfeit gold In 1774 several Spaniards were hanged from the yardarms of Dutch ships for passing off platinum ingots ingot instead of gold In 1828 Russia became the only country in the world to mint platinum platinum platinum plat plat- coins issuing worth that year Strange as it seems those same coins would today be intrinsically worth more than During the World war when the price of platinum rose to a high of an ounce the Russian coins would have been worth nearly half a billion dollars Copyright 1938 for The Telegram