Evening star. [volume], March 04, 1934, Page 6, Image 68

About Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972

Image provided by: Library of Congress, Washington, DC

                
GROWTH OF NATIONAL MONEY FACTORY
Bureau of Engrav
ing and Printing,
Under Treasury,
Was Authorized in
1862—Site of Old
Building Used for
Military Purposes
in Civil War.
Early Residents in
Neighborhood.
BY JOHN CLAGETT PROCTOR.
WHAT we so frequently now refer
to as the old building of the
Bureau of Kngraving and
Printing, at Fourteenth and B
streets southwest, Is not an old
building at all, for its construc
tion was not authorized by Congress until 1878,
and the bureau did not occupy It until July 6,
1880. There are ever so many people who can
personally recall when this building was
erected. Of course, it is the older of the two
buildings, south of the Mall, used by the bu
leau, for the large Doric limestone structure,
doser to the river, is of recent construction.
Several years ago, when the writer was
apeaking of that part of Washington south of
the Mall, known to the early Washingtonian
aa “the Island,” he received a letter from Mrs.
Mary Lloyd Willis, who said she was bom on
the southwest corner of B and Fourteenth
streets, or where the bureau’s red brick build
ing still stands, and which was the first sep
arate structure erected by the Government in
Washington for the engraving and printing of
money.
This bureau Is one of the comparatively re
cent permanent additions to the Government,
not having been provided for by Congress until
July 11, 1862, In accordance with the act of
Congress of that date, which reads:
“And be it further enacted, that the Secre
tary of the Treasury be, and is hereby author
toed, in case he shall think it Inexpedient to
procure said notes, or any part thereof, to be
engraved and printed by contract, to cause the
iiri notes, or any part thereof, to be engraved,
printed and executed in such form as he shall
prescribe, at the Treasury Department in
Washington, or under his direction, and he is
hereby empowered to purchase and provide
all the machinery and materials, and to em
ploy such persons and appoint such officials
as may be necessary for this purpose.”
rE first American paper money, known as
Massachusetts notes, was Issued In 1690,
and then came—85 years later—the Conti
nental bills, engraved by Paul Revere, the best
of the four engravers then in this country.
His famous ride through Charleston to Con
cord on the night of April 18, 1775, to give
warning of the British expedition, which was
resisted the next day at Lexington and Con
cord—a service which has been immortalized
by Longfellow in his poem, “The Midnight
Ride of Paul Revere”—will cause this Ameri
can patriot to be long remembered. But this
tide was a short one compared with the one
he made in 1774, when he rode on horseback
to New York and Philadelphia, scattering
copies of the Boston port bill. Revere subse
quently became grand master of Masons of
Massachusetts, filling the office with honor and
distinction. It was previously left vacant by
Gen. Joseph Warren, when that officer was
killed at Breeds Hill, June 17, 1775.
However, although the Constitution of the
United States went Into effect on March 4,
1789, yet for nearly three-quarters of a cen
tury the Government never saw any reason
why It should make Its own paper money, and
to the meantime several private firms had
sprung Into existence and were making a hand
some profit doing the work. In 1858 nine of
these bank note firms were incorporated under
the title of the “American Bank Note Co.,”
and a few years later the National Bank Note
Co. was organized. The country was growing
in population, and so was its business, and by
1862 the American Bank Note Co. was employ
ing about 350 persons, of whom more than 100
were women.
The Civil War, of course, made an added
demand for Government securities, and it also
made an additional charge on the country for
Interest, as is shown on the face of a series
Of notes issued on August 19, 1861, which place '
the Interest at 7.3 cents, payable semi-annually,
and the privilege to convert the note into a
20-year, 6 per cent United States bond also is
stipulated. These notes, in the denominations
of $50. $100, $500, $1,000 and $5,000, were
printed by the American Bank Note Co., New
York.
demand notes, issued about this time,
Flooded Fourteenth street, between Ohio avenue and B street, in 1889. The Bureau employes traveled along this route to and
from their U'ork.
were the first paper money of the present Gov
ernment. They were followed, in 1862, by the
issues of United States notes commonly known
as •'legal tenders,” or "greenbacks.”
AT THIS period it was the practice, when
the securities were printed, to forward
them to the Treasury Department in Wash
ington for the signatures of the register of the
Treasury and the Treasurer of the United
States, and for the affixing of the seal, while
the trimming and separating of the sheets were
also done by the department before the securi
ties were put into circulation. In this way the
bureau started to grow.
At first the signatures were inscribed by a
corps of clerks, and the notes were trimmed
and the separating of the sheets done by shears,
in the ordinary way. But the ever-increasing
demand for the notes made this slow process
out of the question, as it was impossible for
the workers to keep pace with the needs of the
Government, and, besides this, the system was
unnecessarily expensive. Another thing which
had to be overcome, and which, by the way,
was unintentionally aiding the counterfeiters,
was the dissimilarities in the signatures, due to
the various handwritings employed in complet
ing the notes.
Congress, in March, 1862, came to the rescue
of the Treasury Department and granted per
mission for it to imprint the facsimile signa
tures from engraved plates. The result of this
experiment was so successful that the idea was
conceived of doing all the printing and en
graving in the Treasury Building, and, accord
ingly, the act of July 11, 1862, before referred
to, was passed.
Prom the beginning, the printing of the sig
natures, the trimming and separting of the
sheets and other necessary operations were
done in separate departments, and one of the
earliest moves was to consolidate these into
one division, known as the first division of the
National Currency Bureau, which was later
changed to its present name, but apparently
was retained at least until 1866, when we find
the old form still being issued by the city
directory. S. Morton Clark, appointed chief
in 1662, is mentioned as "chief, National Cur
rency Bureau.” E H. Dougherty was then the
assistant chief; Charles Neale, superintendent
of wet printing; William W. Graham, superin
tendent of dry printing; Charles Evans, as
sistant superintendent; James Gray, superin
tendent of sealing, and L, B. Allyn, chief clerk.
city directories tell a lot of stories,
outne of which we may be proud of and
•otne of which we may not be, but, after all, it
Is always best to say the good things and pass
over those which might be hurtful. And so,
one of the nice things which met the eye of the
writer in copying the names of the employes of
the National Currency Bureau of 1866 was of
that sterling citizen, John Joy Ed son, who on
the 17th day of May of this year will have
rounded out just 88 years, 71 of which have
been usefully and successfully employed in the
city of his adoption.
Mr. Ed son's name appeared in the liM. of em
ployes of the office of the controller of the cur
rency, where he was then a clerk, his associates
in the office being: Controller, Freeman Clarke;
deputy controller, H. R. Hulbard; chief ac
countant, H. Baldwin; cashier, Linus M. Price;
organization of banks, Albon Man; statistical
division, Charles Callender; bend clerk, O. W.
Comstock; clerks, George W. Lord, James T.
Hoe wens te in, John Burroughs. George A. At
wood. David Lewis, Henry W. Jennings, J.
Franklin Bates, Charles E. Weaver, Charles Van
Dusen, James L. Hatch, E. A. McKay, M. D.
O’Connell, F. C. Cate, Edward Wolcott, John
W. Griffin, George W. Martin, John D. Patten,
Jr.; H. H. Smith, Edward S. Peck, J. W. Adams,
Charles J. Kendall, Charles H. Cherry, Henry
W. Berth wrong. D. F. Hamlink, George Wood,
C. D. Smith and Winslow Joyce; messengers,
Michael Weaver, J. B. A. Schureman, J. H.
Kaufman and H. Nater.
In 1862 the Currency Bureau needed but little
space, and one room in the attic of the west
Buildings at Fourteenth and B streets southwest recently removed when the site
teas cleared for new huildines of the Department of Amrieulture.
wing of the Treasury Building sufficed Soon,
however, it began gradually to do the work being
done by the bank note companies, and by 1874
the Government was inserting a 90-day clause
in Its contracts, since it was found that the
work could be done much cheaper by the
Treasury, and from that time on the work was
taken over by the Government as rapidly as
possible.
BY 1877 we And that unwise politics had
been at work in the bureau, and that more
than half a thousand unnecessary employes
were engaged there. This was at the beginning
of President Hayes’ administration, and a house
cleaning was ordered, with the result that on
April 18 the services of 538 workers were sum
marily dispensed with. Nor were the officials
overlooked, for IS days later the bureau was put
into the hands of new officers, who proceeded
to reorganize that branch in every department.
The new set-up included the following offi
cers: Chief of bureau, Edward McPherson; as
sistant chief, O. H. Irish: accountant. Thomas
J. Sullivan; engraving division superintendent,
George W. Casilear; printing division super
intendent, Ward Morgan; examining division
superintendent, Annie E. Bealle; binding di
vision, T. P. Sparks; numbering and separating
division superintendent, Annie Ft. Roe; wetting
division superintendent, Charles G. Evans;
superintendent of orders, Annie M. Flayes;
custodian of dies, rolls, etc., John W. Kimball;
vault keeper, James W. Moore, and master ma
chinist, J. Q. Larin an.
Irrespective of who was to blame for the
employing of the unnecessary number of per
sons mentioned, no doubt the wholesale dis
charge worked a considerable hardship upon
many worthy and innocent people. This was
a period of panics and failures, caused by a
depression begun about 1873, and which was
a long way from normal 11 years later, when
banks and brokers in New York went under,
carrying with them in the crash the barking
Arm of Grant * Ward, at the head of which
was Gen. U. S. Grant.
It was a very gloomy period, and only
those who lived through it and perhaps suf
fered the sting of poverty can realize what
it is to want for the necessaries of life and
maybe—and most likely, too—some of these
let out of the service in 1877 (though the
drastic course may have been thoroughly jus
tifiable) were among those who later needed
help most.
BY 1878 the space occupied by the Bureau
of Engraving and Printing in the Treasury
Building had reached such proportions that
Congress finally agreed to render relief, and
accordingly, on June 20, appropriated $327,
536 for the purchase of a site and for the
erecting thereon of a separate fireproof build
ing. This was, according to the report of
the Secretary of the Treasury for that year,
“progressing satisfactorily, and will probably
be completed during the Pall of 1879,” which
only goes to show that the Government can
erect its buildings In a hurry when it wants to.
The Secretary, in the same report, also
makes the Interesting statement: "It Is as
sumed from the action of Congress at the
last session that It bolds that the engraving
and printing of the ptlolic securities can be
more cheaply, perfectly and safely done in
this bureau than in private establishments,
and the Secretary has, therefore, directed that
all work of this description, except certain
proprietary stamps, shall be done therein*
The repeat further states that "the cost of the
work is one-half the price previously paid.”
Evidently the ground upon which the eld