Hi Lists, I received the following from another list & asked for permission to post it. I found this very interesting & thought it might be helpful in regard to money being used in this time period: ----- Original Message ----- From: <[email protected]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Sunday, November 24, 2002 8:15 PM Subject: Re: [PACHESTE] SCHEME Of A LOTTERY, 1762 In a message dated 11/23/2002 2:36:03 PM Central Standard Time, [email protected] writes: January 14, 1762 The Pennsylvania Gazette > > SCHEME Of A LOTTERY, for raising Fifteen Hundred Dollars, to help to > > finish the New Presbyterian Church, now erecting in the Forks of > > Brandywine. > Wait one. > > I guess I don't understand a 1762 posting that refers to money as dollars'. > > I thought the currency of the realm at that time was pounds ... and shillings ... and pence, etc. > > Can someone explain this ?? > > DICK FOLKERTH > Dallas, Texas Allow me to venture a guess as to what the term dollars might have meant in 1762. As you know, George III was slipping in and out of insanity, and would not allow any mintage of royal coinage. I don't know the exact timing of this, but suffice to say his attitude and the rapid expansion of commerce in the colonies caused a lasting and inconvenient shortage of coinage, even down to farthings, pence, and shillings. One of the more popular coins used was the Spanish Eight Reales, often called a dollar. Eventually, the Bank of England bought a number of these coins from Spain, and stamped a tiny royal bust on the neck of the Spanish king. This lead to the creation of a rhyme: The bank to make its Spanish dollars pass Stamped the head of a fool on the neck of an ass. Notwithstanding the legitimization of the Dollar many of them were used in their "native" state. Actually the Spanish Eight Reales piece was legal tender in the United States until (I think) 1856. Incidentally, the dollar, being of good silver, was cut into "bits"...eight of them, thus "two bits", a quarter, "four bits", half a dollar, if you are old enough to remember the use of those terms. One bit was a "picayune", an eighth of a dollar, and one supposes, the price of a pack of those New Orleans cigarettes called "Picayune"; strong enough to curl your hair! Or perhaps the entire Scheme of a Lottery was a fake! Phil Andrew Lache pas la patat