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Show 'Know Your Money and You'll Not Be. Losing It to Counterfeiters,' Says Chief of the United States Secret Service ,-TT- 1 J 1 1 71 1 B 00000000 A 133 7 H F T i " i i . . T r.fL1L- SERIES PORTRAIT CHECK. FACE PtRTE MUM6EP ptrM&aj rOrVTKArT 1 LETTER 1 NUMBER Study the above diagram it shows you the position of important features of United States paper money . If you get a suspected bill, compare it with a genuine bill and observe carefully the following features : By ELMO SCOTT WATSON (Released by Western Newspaper Union.) WHEN your friends say to you, "Well, don't take any wooden nickels!" you laugh heartily for you recognize recog-nize it as a good joke. Of course, you wouldn't take any wooden nickels! But there's always a chance that you'll do something worse take a paper bill that looks as though it's worth $1 or $5 or $10. But it's just as worthless as a wooden nickel because it s a' counterfeit. In fact, during a recent five-year five-year period Americans were swindled to the tune of $1,-000,000 $1,-000,000 a year by counterfeiters counterfeit-ers and these crooks got by with it mainly because of the indifference and ignorance of their victims. How about YOU.' Do you ever do more than just glance casually at the paper bills that are handed you in making change especially when they're handed you by a stranger? Do you know whose portrait is on a one-dollar bill, pr a five, or a ten? Do you know what pictures are on the backs of those bills? If you do, you have made a good beginning towards protecting your pocketbook from the counterfeiter. counterfeit-er. If you don't know the outstanding out-standing features of your money, you have only yourself to blame if you become the victim of the counterfeiter and his vicious racket. "Yes," you say, "but how can I learn about money? I know what it looks like, but I don't know what to look for." Well, the United States Secret Service has undertaken to show you what to look for. A trial educational edu-cational campaign indicated that this loss was largely due to your lack of knowledge about money. But the campaign also showed that enlightenment of the people would protect them. Therefore, the campaign of education against crime was intensified, under the slogan "Know Your Money." For the calendar year of 1940 the public pub-lic losses through acceptance of counterfeit notes were reduced to about $100,000. The Secret Service Serv-ice believes this 90 per cent reduction re-duction is the dividend of its "Know Your Money" campaign. Newspaper stories, magazine articles and educational pamphlets pam-phlets carry the message into homes, schools and the business world. A 32-page illustrated booklet, book-let, just oil the press, entitled "Know Your Money," published by the Secret Service, tells how to detect counterfeit notes and coins, and how you may protect yourself bgainst the forger of government checks. The booklet may be obtained ob-tained from the Superintendent of Documents, Government Printing Odice, Washington, D. C, for 10 cents the copy. A sound motion picture, also entitled "Know Your Money," entirely made by the Secret Service, and with Lowell Thomas as commentator, is being shown in high schools in the 43 states and to business groups of 100 persons or more. "There is no secret formula for detecting a counterfeit note," says Frank J. Wilson, chief of the United Unit-ed States Secret Service. "Years of experience have proven that the human eye is the best counterfeit coun-terfeit detector in existence. But it must be properly trained. Genuine Gen-uine paper money is printed on distinctive paper containing tiny red and blue silk threads. The printing is clone from steel-cn-gruved plates made by a corps of the most expert engravers in the world. "Do you have a bill in your pocket or purse? Take it out now and look closely at the portrait of Washington, Lincoln, or another of the great Americans shown on the various denominations. You will see that the facial characteristics character-istics arc shaded by small clots and clashes, each of which is clear and distinct. In the portrait bnck- $ ground you will see tiny perfectly square spaces between horizontal and vertical lines, which are also very clear. Around the border of the bill, face and back, are intricate intri-cate white lines resembling a net. These are known as the geometrical geometri-cal lathework, and each line is unbroken un-broken from beginning to end. Look at the colored treasury seal on the face of the bill. Around its outer edge are many sharp points which look like the teeth of a circular cir-cular saw. "The counterfeiter has a hard time to imitate a bill and most counterfeits are crude, but sometimes some-times he makes one above the average. av-erage. Whether a counterfeit is a good or poor reproduction, you should be able to detect it by comparison com-parison with a note of the same denomination which is known to be genuine. A comparison of this kind will readily disclose defects in the portrait, the seal and the lathework border, and is definitely definite-ly the best method of counterfeit detection. If the suspected bill is 1 i FRANK J. WILSON counterfeit, its portrait will be dull, smudgy or scratchy in appearance. ap-pearance. The points on the counterfeit coun-terfeit treasury seal will be uneven un-even or blunt, instead of sharp and regular. The white net lines in the bprder will be broken in many places, and generally the texture of the paper and the color of the ink will be quite different than the genuine." It is often said that if the ink or color can be rubbed ofT a bill, the bill is counterfeit. Nothing could be more wrong, according to Mr. Wilson. The ink or color can be rubbed from both genuine and counterfeit notes, and such a test proves nothing. Counterfeit coins are also a source of trouble. Genuine silver coins have a clear, bell-like ring. Counterfeits sound dull. Ring silver sil-ver coins on hard surface and beware be-ware of those which sound like stone. In extremely rare instances, in-stances, genuine silver coins may have an invisible crack or air bubble bub-ble which would make them sound dull. However, these are so few that your chances of receiving one are very slight indeed. The corrugated outer edge of silver coins is known as the "reeding." "reed-ing." It is this feature which slM)uld be closely examined on suspected sus-pected coins. Likewise, this reeding reed-ing should be compared with that on a coin of the same denomination denomina-tion known to he genuine. On most counterfeits the reeding is noticc-ubly noticc-ubly imperfect, but on genuine coins the corrugations are regular regu-lar and distinct. In some cases, of course, the reeding is completely complete-ly worn away on genuine coins which have circulated for a long time. PORTRAIT On genuine bills, the portrait is lifelike, stands out from the oval background which is a fine screen of regular lines. Notice particularly the eyes. On a counterfeit the portrait is dull, smudgy or unnaturally white; scratchy; the background is dark with irregular and broken lines. The portraits of 11 great Americans Ameri-cans appear on United States money. It is important for your protection that you know on which bills these portraits appear. Regardless Re-gardless of the type of bill, all bills of the same denomination bear the same portrait, as follows: Washington on all $ 1 bills Jefferson on all $ Z bills Lincoln on all $ 5 bills Hamilton on all S 10 bills Jackson on all $ 20 bills Grant on all S 50 bills Franklin on all S 100 bills McKinley on all $ 500 bills Cleveland on all $ 1,000 bills Madison on all S 5,000 bills Chase on all 510,000 bills 2. SEAL On the genuine bill, the sawtooth points around the rim are identical and sharp. On the. counterfeit these points are usually different, uneven, broken off. 3. SERLVL NUMBERS On the genuine bill, they are distinctive in style, firmly and evenly printed in the same color as the seal. On the counterfeit the style is different, differ-ent, poorly printed, badly spaced, uneven in appearance. 4. PAPER Genuine bills are printed on distinctive paper containing con-taining very small red and blue silk threads. The following information about paper currency will also be helpful: help-ful: SIGNATURES The signature of the secretary of the treasury appears at the lower right side on the front of all United States paper pa-per money. The signature of the treasurer of the United States appears ap-pears on the lower left side. TYPES OF CURRENCY Our government now prints three types of currency or paper money: federal fed-eral reserve notes, silver certificates, certifi-cates, and United States notes. Every note or bill is distinguished distin-guished by words telling which type it is, printed at the top of the bill on its face or front. The type of each bill is also shown by the color of its treasury seal and serial seri-al numbers. The treasury seal and serial numbers are GREEN on federal reserve notes, RED on United States notes, and BLUE on silver certificates. FEDERAL RESERVE NOTES Federal reserve notes are placed in circulation by the federal reserve re-serve banks, each bank placing its own notes in circulation through the banks located in its district. There are 12 federal reserve districts. dis-tricts. Each district has a number num-ber and a corresponding letter of the alphabet for its symbol. SYMHOI. DISTRICT '-"J LH1EK MM1UU Boston A 1 New York B 2 Philadelphia C 3 Cleveland D 4 Richmond K 5 Atlanta F 6 Chicago G 7 St. Louis H g Minneapolis 1 9 Kansas City J 10 Dallas K 11 San Francisco L 12 The letter "A" in the regional bank seal on a federal reserve note shows that it was issued by the Boston Federal Reserve bank in the First district. The letter "B" in the regional bank seal anil the figure "2" shows that a bill was issued from the Federal Reserve Re-serve Bank of New York, and so on through the list of the 12 banks to San Francisco, whine symbol letter Is "L" and district number is "12." The regional bank seal and the district number on federal fed-eral reserve notes re always BLACK. |