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Basement Coin Room at Treasury Building, Washington DC - 1910.
RogerB
Posts: 8,852 ✭✭✭✭✭
Notice the coin counting machine at lower left and in the background a truck with bags of coin awaiting the clerk's attention.
Originally there were four volumes of photographs showing each room in the Treasury building during working hours, and describing the functions performed there. Over the years all but one volume have been lost or stolen. Similar photographs were made at the Philadelphia Mint, but nearly all of those are missing. Only a photo of the Engraving Department employees and a few others remain.
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Neat. I like the broom on the wall in case of spillage, and the cascade of desk lamps pointing everywhere.
Pete
In 1910 a 40-watt bulb was considered "bright" and sufficient for most purposes. Many users evidently thought differently and batches of desk lamps often appear in old photos. Mint workers had complained about lack of brightness once electric lights were introduced - even though a typical electric bulb produced more light than gas. Some of the problem might have been that prior to ordinary bayonet or screw-base bulbs, carbon arc lamps were in industrial use and they produced a lot more light than the little 20- and 40-watt light bulbs used to replace carbon arc.
Gotta be a special place in he!! for someone who would steal archive material.
Neat old photograph, I like it !!!
Great pic.
I like that big scale too.
I see the work station surface has rounded corners which makes a lot of sense. Coins like to stay put or hide in square corners.
"If I say something in the woods and my wife isn't there to hear it.....am I still wrong?"
My Washington Quarter Registry set...in progress
Great photograph.....such a shame about the missing volumes of pictures....probably in some attic somewhere or tossed in the garbage when cleaning a basement. Cheers, RickO
Nice windows for a "basement." I presume this was the ground level and the "first floor" was one flight up?
Are these new coins, or old coins sent back to the Mint for sorting into "melt em!" and "good enough to reissue" piles?
Edit: You are correct. I just looked at the building.
A "basement" was any part of a building that was at least partially excavated. The New Orleans Mint had a "basement" although it was almost entirely above local ground level.
Treasury clerks and workers sorted through coins shipped from sub-treasuries (not 'basement' treasuries...) and removed fakes, mutilated and foreign coins. These were debited against the sub-treasury deposit which was then debited to the individual banks who made the original deposit. Gold coins received preferential treatment, then silver and finally minor. The whole process could take months. The same procedure was observed at Federal Reserve Banks when they replaced sub-treasuries.
Seems antiquated for only 8 years ago.
Can you just imagine what could have been in those bags?
At the time there was a lot of public concern about "dirty money." Treasury began washing bank notes and many large banks and high-end hotels actually washed their coins before using them. (There is a "Dirty Jobs" episode about coin washing at the St. Regis hotel in San Francisco. "Washing" was more like scouring and buffing than removing dirt....Someone posted about it, I think.) There are several letters in Mint archives about banks paying long-distance transportation for shiny new coins for their clients, and then there was the Christmas New Year demand also.