WHAT’S HAPPENING IN GOLDEN TODAY?
8:30-9:30AM Power Training (Virtual)
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11AM and 4PM Wild West Short Tour
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TRIVIA
7-8PM Colorado Trivia League @ Morris & Mae
GOLDEN HISTORY MOMENT
104 Years Ago
The July 24th, 1919 Colorado Transcript included an article about the Treasury Department’s new savings program targeting schoolchildren. The goal was to encourage children to invest their money in War Savings Stamps.
To make the program more exciting, they used World War I surplus hand grenades as banks (explosive material removed beforehand). When issued the grenade, the child was required to sign a contract acknowledging that the grenade remained the property of the issuing bank until he or she had purchased at least one War Savings Stamp with a face value of five dollars. Children ten or older were required to purchase two Savings Stamps to earn their grenades. Children who did not purchase the requisite number of stamps were required to return the grenades to the issuing bank by October 1, 1919.
The Transcript article was printed at the behest of “John T. Wayland, Director of Savings for the Tenth Federal Reserve District.” As he envisioned the program, every teacher in the county would distribute the banks at the beginning of the school year, require pupils to sign the contracts, etc.
I don’t know whether this program was a hit with the children, the teachers, or the banks. I never saw another word about it in the Transcript. I do wonder how many children in 1919 had enough money to invest in $5 War Savings Stamps. I also wonder whether teachers were comfortable pressuring kids to come up with investment money. And I wonder whether parents wanted their kids lobbing cast iron hand grenades–even if they were no longer explosive.
Thanks to the Golden History Museum for providing the online cache of historic Transcripts, and to the Golden Transcript for documenting our history since 1866!
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