Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 February 1892 — Disappearance of Copper Coins. [ARTICLE]

Disappearance of Copper Coins.

The one-eent pieoes coined by the Government seem to vanish and no one knows where. During the year 1891 Government coined nearly one hundred millions of pennies, and the cost of them is about a tenth of a cent each, and the coinage of these pieces continues. A penny changes hands in trade ten times as often as a dime, and they are of so little value that little care is taken of them. The country onee coined 800,000 halfcente, and they have all disappeared. Of our larger old copper pennies, nearly the size of the silver half-dol-lar, 120,000,000 remain unaccounted for, and we rarely see one of them now. Three million of the four and a half million bronze two-cent pieces remain unaccounted for, and 2,000,000 of the nickel three-cent pieces are still outstanding, and we now rarely see one of them. From these facts the small copper and nickel coins seem to be nearly all profit to the Government, as a majority never come back to be redeemed. A large amount of the fractional currency issued during war time has never come back to the treasury for redemption.