Reuters
We’ve seen Washingtons, Jacksons, and even Benjamins. But a Chase (that’s Salmon P. Chase, the Treasury Secretary for Abraham Lincoln)? On a $10,000 bill? Now that’s one we’ve never had the privilege of holding.
You don’t need to get your eyes checked: that’s a single note worth ten grand. Such bills do exist, but they rarely emerge from their holders’ hands. So when one popped up Monday at a bank in the Boston suburb of Lowell, Mass., employees were correct in their suspicion.
Michael Gallagher, risk management director at Enterprise Bank, said the bill hasn’t been printed since 1934 and he believes there’s only 300 in circulation, so they were fairly sure they weren’t seeing a piece of history come into their bank earlier this week but a crime. The bill was sent along to the Federal Reserve for examination, and the woman was sent out of the bank 10,000 fake dollars poorer. (Read more about the fine art of counterfeiting)
Out of all the places to use a fake bill, a bank is sure to raise the most suspicion. That said, most movie theaters or grocery stores probably wouldn’t have been able to give her the proper change for her purchase.
Secret Service spokesman Eric Zahren said the amount of counterfeit money in circulation is a fraction of one percent of the total $829 billion dollars swirling around the US in 2007.
For the record: NewsFeed would be very interested in further researching the $10,000 bill, so if any of our loyal readers happen to be holding onto a genuine artifact, please feel free to send one (or a couple) our way. Or better yet: Stop by in person; we’re at 50th St. and 6th Ave. in New York City, next to a couple of lovely coffee shops. Lattes will be on us. (via Lowell Sun)
— By Nick Carbone