6
(teeBiKftOf A Note
Woodrow Wilson Is Framed By Zeroes On Hiis Bill
MARCIA COGGINS, BILL ALLEN, AND CHRIS WORTH
clown in last year’s production of “Scapino”. (Photo by
David Swanson)
Highland Players
Rather than in mylar and
lasar lights, this show can be
visualized in potted plants,
cucumber sandwiches, lace
and ascots. This is very much
a period piece and will be
played as such. McDonald
does, however, intend to find
a suitable acting area other
than the proscenium stage in
the L.A. auditorium,
preferably on the student
housing side of the lake.
The final show this season
will be Michael Cristofer’s
“The Shadow Box” (April 27-
29), directed by Brad Ford.
“The Shadow Box” won the
Pulitzer Prize, the Drama
Critics Circle Award and a
Tony Award for best play of
1977. Set in three separate
guest cottages associated
with a hospital treating
terminal cancer patients, the
play deals with the struggles
and frustrations of the
patients and their families as
they face the inevitability of
death. Although a serious
work, Cristofer puts to ef
fective use the ironic humor
that seems inherent in any
consideration of a forewarned
death.
Aside from these four
mainstage productions there
will be experimental theatre
activities as interest dictates
and there is a possibility of a
radio show being produced in
association with WSAP. All
students are cordially invited
and encouraged to audition
for any or all of the shows and
to work in any aspect of St.
Andrews technical theatre
that they wish. Of course
everyone is invited to attend
the performances. If you are
interested in working with a
show or are curious about the
Highland Players, please feel
free to contact Brad Ford or
any member of the Highland
Players Council.
Season tickets go on sale
Sept. 21.
$100,000 Certificates
Only Collector's Items
By Barbara S. Moffett
National Geographic News Service
Some bills in the Treasury
Department vault are just too
attractive to toss into an
incinerator.
So this year when Treasury
officials decided to get rid of nearly
$2 billion in gold certificates that
had been locked up for years, they
set a few aside. Among them were
eight $100,000 notes, the largest
denomination ever issued in the
United States.
The notes had been lying around
since 1934, about the point in the
Depression when President
Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered the
Federal Reserve banks to turn in all
of their gold.
Golden lOUs
“The Federal Reserves had
huge quantities of gold-some had
millions of dollars worth,”
explained O.H. Tomkinson of the
Treasury Department. “So to pay
them back, the Treasury had those
lOUs printed up.” For convenience,
the “lOUs” were printed in the
form of big bills-^lOOs, $1,000s,
$10,000s, and the mind-boggling
$100,000s.
Printed only to repay the Federal
Reserve banks, some of the gold
certificates-which bear Woodrow
Wilson’s portrait-never made it out
of the Treasury vaidt. Those that
remained locked away included the
first note of each denomination,
marked with serial number
AOOOOOOOl A.
“Fortunately, somebody at the
Treasury had the foresight to keep
them,” Tomkinson told the National
Geographic Society. That foresight
also is appreciated by Elvira Clain-
Stefanelli, curator of numismatics
of the Smithsonian Institution, the
new caretaker of some of the notes.
Mrs. Stefanelli said that although
the $100,000 note is only one of many
rare bills on display at the Museum
of History and Technology, it
draws people like a magnet.
“One hundred thousand seems to
be the magic number,” she said.
“But actually it’s just a piece of
paper. Somebody could steal it, but
they couldn’t spend it.”
Somebody could spend a $10,000
bill-the largest ever issued to the
American public. The bill, bearing a
portrait of Sahnon P. Chase,
secretary of the Treasury under
Abraham Lincoln, was last printed
in 1945.
Not In Demand
That year the Bureau of
Engraving and Printing also quit
making the other big bills, the $500,
$1,000, and $5,000. It was almost 25
years before the Federal Reserves
used up their stocks of the bills.
“There just was no great demand
for them,” explained Herbert
Krisak of the Bureau of Engraving
and Printing. “People started using
checks and credit cards instead.”
Athough banks now are supposed
to turn these big bills in to the
Federal Reserves, there still are
some floating around; for example,
362 $10,000 bills remain unaccounted
for. Depending on their series and
condition, the discontinued bills
could be worth considerably more
than their face value, says Harvey
Stack, a rare-money authority in
New York.
Today the biggest biU printed for
circulation is the lowly $100; 67
million of them rolled off the
presses this year. That’s almost
twice as many as were printed the
year before, an increase that might
be attributed to inflation or
hoarding because of mistrust in
financial institutions.
But big bills can mean big losses.
“A person who hangs onto a
$10,000 bill for a year instead of
depositing his money could lose $600
in interest,” Stack pointed out.
They Warned You Not To Do It
They told you that “Lemon” would break down
if you brought it to school, but luckily for you,
it did Noah Fields and College Gulf were there to
bail you out. CoUege Gulf has been bailing out
St. Andrews students for years - everything from
tune-ups to a complete overhaul.
Every Kind Of Service You Need
COLLEGE GULF
401 SOUTH