No. 115 - The Secret Service

The front page of the WSJ's Weekend Journal caught my eye this morning. An article titled, Outfoxing the Counterfeiters, took up the entire page. There were pictures of old paper money including a 1760 Colony of Pennsylvania note with the words "To Counterfeit is DEATH" printed on it.

The article included a brief history of U.S. paper money and counterfeiting. It even included a reference to the supernote, or superdollar, which was the subject of Post No. 112.

I did not know that the Secret Service was originally created to prevent and investigate counterfeiting of the U.S. currency. The Service was created in 1865 just after the Civil War ended. At that time, it was estimated that one-third of the currency in circulation was counterfeit.

After the assassination of President William McKinley in 1901 the Secret Service began to provide presidential protection.

Until March 1, 2003, the Secret Service was part of the U.S. Department of Treasury. On that date they officially became part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.