Money troubles.

I'm starting a new section called "Back to Front" where I dig up and examine stuff that we seem to feel are part of our time and history, when, in fact, they came from a while ago.

So here's a quick look at the Secret Service. I must admit I got onto this upon seeing a picture in Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples of President Abraham Lincoln with a Secret Service agent, Allan Pinkerton. The caption states that the year is 1862, when many other sources say Lincoln established the USSS in 1865. Doesn't matter. Pinkerton looks dogged and observant.

Initially the Seccert Service was charged with eliminating the vast amount of countefeit money that was circulating in the US. This was compounded by the states issuing their own currencies through many different banks. There were hundreds of kinds of ways to pay for things and this just made it so much easier for the bogus bills to proliferate. In 1865 some estimates show one third of the money in circulation was fake.

As history is rife with irony, the USSS was not charged with the protection of the president. In fact Lincoln was assassinated the night of the very day he formed the service. Two more presidents were assassinated (Garfield and McKinley) before the duty was assigned to them in 1901.