The Numismatic Bibliomania Society

PREV ARTICLE       NEXT ARTICLE       FULL ISSUE       PREV FULL ISSUE      

V15 2012 INDEX       E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 15, Number 35, August 19, 2012, Article 8

NEW BOOK: FOLLOW THE MONEY: A MONTH IN THE LIFE OF A TEN-DOLLAR BILL

Where's George? Who cares - Where's Steve? British author Steve Boggan followed a $10 bill 3,500 miles across America and turned his adventure into a book: Follow the Money: A Month in the Life of a Ten-Dollar Bill . Here's an excerpt from an article in The Daily Mail. -Editor

Follow the Money When author Steve Boggan decided to fulfill a life-long ambition to follow a ten-dollar bill across the U.S, it took him on an epic and inspiring journey. Here, he tells his incredible story which has now inspired a book.

Two days ago, I was in Kansas, yesterday it was Somewhere-ville, Missouri, so today … it must be Hot Springs, Arkansas, the place where Bill Clinton grew up.

Not for the first time in the past few days, I ask myself: ‘What on earth am I doing?’

Welcome to a typical morning during the weirdest and most wonderful time of my life, 30 days and nights when I fulfilled an ambition that had been gnawing away at me for years: to follow a ten-dollar bill across the United States of America for a whole month.

Bonkers, I know. Pointless, possibly. Chaotic, definitely. But it took me on an epic journey into the heart of an America I never knew existed.

Follow the Money map I gave away the bill – serial number IA74407937A – and followed as it wheeled across the Great Plains and fizzed through bustling cities, passing from person to person in a great human relay across 3,300 miles, through Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana and, finally, Michigan.

On the way, it introduced me to farmers, truckers, musicians, missionaries, bankers, nurses, army veterans, bartenders, car workers, deer hunters and many others, people who took me into their lives, fed me and gave me a bed for the night.

They made me welcome and demonstrated levels of kindness that left me humbled. They made me laugh and cry, got me drunk on booze and excitement, and held on to me for longer than was entirely necessary out of sheer generosity.

And they did all this because of a piece of paper bearing the image of Alexander Hamilton, the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, and the pity they felt towards the dishevelled, shambolic and rather confused Englishman who was following it.

Follow the Money author I had travelled through the U.S. many times before, but always on assignment, always rushing from place to place on interstate highways, and it was not until the bill took me off the main highways and byways that I discovered the true America.

Our opinions of the States are informed by Hollywood and American foreign policy – a policy that often drags us reluctantly into conflict. But many Americans do not see themselves in these images.

Instead, I found a warmth and friendship I neither expected nor deserved – a coincidence you might say over one or two hundred miles, but across 3,300, something that could not be put down to chance.

To read the complete article, see: How I followed a banknote 3,500 miles across America: British author turns adventures of a $10 bill into a book (www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2188308/Passing-bucks-British
-authors-3-500-mile-epic-journey-U-S-pursuit-10-bill.html)

Wayne Homren, Editor

Google
 
NBS (coinbooks.org) Web

The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org.

To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com

To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum

PREV ARTICLE       NEXT ARTICLE       FULL ISSUE       PREV FULL ISSUE      

V15 2012 INDEX       E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

Copyright © 1998 - 2020 The Numismatic Bibliomania Society (NBS)
All Rights Reserved.

NBS Home Page
Contact the NBS webmaster
coin