Check this out:

A one dollar bill from 1917. Source: http://www.treasurenet.com

Big, eh?

I didn’t realize Emmett and his friends would have to had carried around large wallets.

The old bills are attractive; they were worth something too, since they were based on the gold standard back then.

Here’s the other side:

One dollar bill, reverse, from 1917. Source: http://www.treasurenet.com

Did you know they used to call these bills ‘horse blankets,’ because of their size? It was the last large-sized legal tender note issued. You can read an interesting history of U.S. paper money at this link.

Because of the size of the wallets needed to carry these bills, I read where men would keep their wallets in coat or jacket pockets. The wallets would likely have been too big and chunky for a back pants pocket.

I wonder what else Emmett carried in his wallet?

Categories: Interesting & Odd

Tagged as: horse blankets

jsmith532

Professor,
Communication, Arts, and the Humanities
The University of Maryland Global Campus