Curiosities from the Museum: Shredded Money – 4/11/2024

Over the years at the Wenatchee Valley Museum, there have been some odd and strange things that have been donated to the collection. While currently there is a screening process and procedures in place for donating items, this wasn’t always the case. We occasionally find oddities lying around from years gone by with little or no explanations.

When we were told we were receiving a donation of $16,000 this wasn’t quite what we were expecting. Between the 1870s and 1930s the US Treasury Department returned a large amount of bank notes from circulation and macerated them into a pulp. This pulp was then sold off to various companies who repurposed it into souvenirs for the public to purchase. These 3 items that are located in the Museum are a product of that. Had the bank notes that were used to create these 3 items not been reduced to pulp, they would be worth upwards of $400,000 dollars today.

Please note: This story was originally published in the Comet Magazine in September of 2022. Check out more stories like these in the Comet Magazine.