Treasury of the United States

[Matthew Roberts]

Treasury of the United States
August 24, 1881

 

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[Clay Diggins]

View attachment 2090861
Treasury of the United States
August 24, 1881

What was the check payment for? Seems the appropriations field has been left out from this book scan. That would give us the reason they wrote this man a $4,000 check. Does the book have any more of the draft photo printed?

If you will share the name of the book this is taken from I quite possibly have it in my library and can view the page myself.

 

[Clay Diggins]

I looked in the Treasury "Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of the United States, 1881-1882" and the only payment to a Waltz in there is a payment of $42.87 to an M. F. Waltz by the Quarter-master's Department in 1882.

No proof of anything either way. Not all payments are credited to the final recipient. The only payment for $4000.00 in those years was for the improvements on the Plymouth Mass. harbor.

The Treasury does note the purchase of silver and gold for coinage but no receipts for this Waltz.

Do you have reason to believe this Waltz on the Warrant is the same man as the person who claimed to have discovered and kept secret a rich goldmine in the Superstitions?

​

 

[Matthew Roberts]

I looked in the Treasury "Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of the United States, 1881-1882" and the only payment to a Waltz in there is a payment of $42.87 to an M. F. Waltz by the Quarter-master's Department in 1882.

No proof of anything either way. Not all payments are credited to the final recipient. The only payment for $4000.00 in those years was for the improvements on the Plymouth Mass. harbor.

The Treasury does note the purchase of silver and gold for coinage but no receipts for this Waltz.

Do you have reason to believe this Waltz on the Warrant is the same man as the person who claimed to have discovered and kept secret a rich goldmine in the Superstitions?

​

Thanks for the information. Know very little of the specifics.

 

[Clay Diggins]

Thanks for the information. Know very little of the specifics.

But you must have put it up on this forum for some reason. Do you think this Waltz is the same person as the Jacob Walz of the never proven Superstition gold mine? Do you know what book this was copied from? It was clearly published. Do you know who copied the original xerox that the book image was printed from?

There are a lot of Waltz' out there. Without some provenance this is nothing but another rumor of treasure. There are more of those rumors out there than there are Waltz'.

 

[Matthew Roberts]

But you must have put it up on this forum for some reason. Do you think this Waltz is the same person as the Jacob Walz of the never proven Superstition gold mine? Do you know what book this was copied from? It was clearly published. Do you know who copied the original xerox that the book image was printed from?

There are a lot of Waltz' out there. Without some provenance this is nothing but another rumor of treasure. There are more of those rumors out there than there are Waltz'.

Possibly someone might have information on a US Treasury warrant or draft transfer.
Have no evidence whatsoever this is the Waltz of lost Dutchman fame.

 

[ConceptualizedNetherlandr]

Possibly someone might have information on a US Treasury warrant or draft transfer.
Have no evidence whatsoever this is the Waltz of lost Dutchman fame.

How did you come to have this copy?

 

[Idahodutch]

View attachment 2090861
Treasury of the United States
August 24, 1881

Matthew,
I find it interesting that the year is 1881 and is to a man named Jacob Waltz.
The amount although, looks to me like $7,000.

Clay,
the style of the other 4’s written, don’t seem to match up with the $dollar amount number, if that is another 4 ??
I have seen many 7’s written like how that $dollar amount presents.
What has you leaning towards a 4?
Just curious….. maybe there is a $7,000 amount where you were looking for a $4,000 entry?

 

[Matthew Roberts]

Matthew,
I find it interesting that the year is 1881 and is to a man named Jacob Waltz.
The amount although, looks to me like $7,000.

Clay,
the style of the other 4’s written, don’t seem to match up with the $dollar amount number, if that is another 4 ??
I have seen many 7’s written like how that $dollar amount presents.
What has you leaning towards a 4?
Just curious….. maybe there is a $7,000 amount where you were looking for a $4,000 entry?

Yes, does look to be a 7 although easy to mistake it for a 4.
Do not have a photo of the entire paper.

 

[Clay Diggins]

Matthew,
I find it interesting that the year is 1881 and is to a man named Jacob Waltz.
The amount although, looks to me like $7,000.

Clay,
the style of the other 4’s written, don’t seem to match up with the $dollar amount number, if that is another 4 ??
I have seen many 7’s written like how that $dollar amount presents.
What has you leaning towards a 4?
Just curious….. maybe there is a $7,000 amount where you were looking for a $4,000 entry?

I agree it could be intended to be a 7. The only reason I went for the 4 instead of the 7 is because the 4 has three loops in it. That was a common form of writing 4 in cursive numbers. I think the 7 only had one or two loops in cursive traditionally. Also the Europen 7 with a bar through it was more common at the time. Like this 7.

Either way it was a huge amount of money for any individual in 1881. $4,000 was more than 15 pounds of gold coin or more than 245 pounds of silver coin. More than a 25 years of wages for a skilled working man. Pretty much a lifetime of wages for a common laborer.

I did look through the Treasury Receipts and Expenditures for that time from to look for a $7000 payout. There were several $7,000 disbursements:
Improving Harbor at Pultneyville, New York $7,000.
Improving Harbor at Wilson, New York $7,000.
Experimental Garden Department of Agriculture c/o G. B. Loring - $7,000.
Support of Federal Prisoners in United States Courts payment to each State. Minnesota in 1882 received $7,000.

And that's pretty much it for the gov's accounting books. I don't think most people realize how much money $7,000 or even $4,000 was in 1881. A single individual receiving that much money from the government probably would have been a public scandal unless that person were selling land, and lots of it, to the government.

 

[Idahodutch]

Matthew,
thank you for posting the image.
$7,000 would be just under $700,000 in todays terms.

Back then it was approximately 350 ounces of gold or maybe 150 -200 pounds of high grade ore …. Or maybe a burro load.

Clay,
That’s why I was asking about the dollar amount being $7,000

Right now, it’s just 1 more coincidence 🥸🤓

 

[Matthew Roberts]

Roughly figuring, in 1881 gold was an average of $20.67 per ounce. $7,000 divided by $20.67 would come out to approximately 338 ounces (21 pounds standard weight) of gold depending on its purity.
That would have been a small to average transaction for a mine but a notable one for an individual if that were the case.

 

[Matthew Roberts]

The standard gold bar in 1881 was the same as today, approximately 27 pounds of gold.

To put in perspective, $7000 of gold in 1881 would be approximately 21 pounds of gold, or 6 pounds less than one standard bar in 1881.

 

[Clay Diggins]

$7,000 dollars of gold in 1861 was worth exactly $7,000 in gold coin. Gold was money. You did not exchange gold for paper notes unless you were rich and stupid. Those who did exchange were no longer rich. That's how real money works.

Gold could be exchanged for currency (coin) but the currency was only 90% gold (and your highest grade mine ore from anywhere would rarely exceed 60% gold). Most miners sent their refined gold to the U.S. Mint to have the gold and silver minted into coin and returned to them as U.S. money (gold and silver coin).

$7,000 dollars of anything in 1881 would be worth 350 $20.00 gold coins. 350 $20.00 gold coins weigh 25.78 pounds.
(350 x 33.436 grams = 11,702 grams. 11,702 / 28.3495 = 412.78352 ounces /16 = 25.78 pounds of 20 dollar gold coins)

350 gold coins could be exchanged for 7,000 90% Silver dollars weighing 412.5 pounds.
(7,000 X 26.73 grams = 187,000 grams /28.349= 6,600 ounces = 412.5 pounds)

End result? $7,000 in 1881 weighed:

25.78 pounds in U.S. gold coin.
or
412.5 pounds in U.S. silver coin.
It wouldn't matter if you converted everything to $10 or $5 gold pieces or silver dimes the weights would remain the same.

The ratio of gold to silver value is set by Congress (U.S. Constitution Article 1 Section 8).
In 1881 the ratio was set at 16 ounces of silver = 1 ounce of gold. Now watch the magic proof for the above numbers:

412.5 / 16 = 25.78
or
25.78 x 16 = 412.5

Weights and dollar amounts agree to the penny. When money is based on Specie (gold and silver) the weight will always tell you the value and value will always determine the weight.

Suyanisqatsi

 

[JohnWhite]

At todays spot price one only needs 3.64 ounces of gold to equal $7,000…And that is with the $24 per ounce drop…

Ed T

 

[Idahodutch]

Matthew,
Of the folks responding here, the general consensus seems to be that the amount being talked about is $7,000 and not $4,000.

That is quite the coincidence if the Waltz that was issued the draft, was not the Waltz of the famous lost mine. 🥴🤷🏼‍♂️

 

[Matthew Roberts]

Matthew,
Of the folks responding here, the general consensus seems to be that the amount being talked about is $7,000 and not $4,000.

That is quite the coincidence if the Waltz that was issued the draft, was not the Waltz of the famous lost mine. 🥴🤷🏼‍♂️

Yes, it seems it is a 7 and not a 4.
While the draft in no way proves the named Waltz is the Dutchman, it also doesn't prove he isn't.

Back in 2005 Steve Creager was running down the draft and had gathered it was one of three pieces of a transaction between National Banks. Steve passed away in 2006 while writing an article for the Arizona Historical Society and the SMHS Museum.

 

[Clay Diggins]

The draft being presented is just a portion of a xerox that was later halftoned for inclusion in a book. I doubt it was a newspaper because the screen pattern when extrapolated over the size of the original draft would have been too fine for newsprint. I have no doubt that the original xerox was created after 1959.

Once again the provenance of this image is all that matters. It's very suspect that someone was working from a xerox copy. The reason I say this is it was common practice in the printing industry right up to the 1985 era to make a xerox copy of flat artwork, modify or correct it with a pen or glued on type and then halftone and print the result. This was seen as the quickest and easiest way to change a price, title or contours on clothing etc. Although this method was for the most part used for honest purposes there are many instances where viewers were intentionally fooled by this method, often for years on end. Today these same techniques are used with computer programs bypassing the xerox step.

Without some knowledge of the source I don't see where this "clue" amounts to any more than fantasy. We've already established that there was no Treasury draft recorded during that period to a Waltz. We know that gold ore was exchanged at the mint for coin so there was no need for a draft. Without the details of the appropriation that was cut off in this copy we can't even know what this draft was written for.

I'm obviously missing something with the wink and a nod on the $7000 number as it relates to the Waltz in Arizona. I've never seen any indication that Jacob Waltz received $7000 for anything, if he had he would have been one of the richest men in the State yet he died a pauper without a home. This story doesn't fit or add up with the facts as I know them. Maybe more experienced story chasers can share with me the significance of the $7000 figure.

 

[Idahodutch]

The draft being presented is just a portion of a xerox that was later halftoned for inclusion in a book. I doubt it was a newspaper because the screen pattern when extrapolated over the size of the original draft would have been too fine for newsprint. I have no doubt that the original xerox was created after 1959.

Once again the provenance of this image is all that matters. It's very suspect that someone was working from a xerox copy. The reason I say this is it was common practice in the printing industry right up to the 1985 era to make a xerox copy of flat artwork, modify or correct it with a pen or glued on type and then halftone and print the result. This was seen as the quickest and easiest way to change a price, title or contours on clothing etc. Although this method was for the most part used for honest purposes there are many instances where viewers were intentionally fooled by this method, often for years on end. Today these same techniques are used with computer programs bypassing the xerox step.

Without some knowledge of the source I don't see where this "clue" amounts to any more than fantasy. We've already established that there was no Treasury draft recorded during that period to a Waltz. We know that gold ore was exchanged at the mint for coin so there was no need for a draft. Without the details of the appropriation that was cut off in this copy we can't even know what this draft was written for.

I'm obviously missing something with the wink and a nod on the $7000 number as it relates to the Waltz in Arizona. I've never seen any indication that Jacob Waltz received $7000 for anything, if he had he would have been one of the richest men in the State yet he died a pauper without a home. This story doesn't fit or add up with the facts as I know them. Maybe more experienced story chasers can share with me the significance of the $7000 figure.

Clay,
This may be a case of another one of those mysteries of the superstitions. 🥴😁 🤷🏼‍♂️

 

[Clay Diggins]

No longer a mystery! I looked up the basis for issuing warrants during that period and here is what the Secretary of the Treasury includes with the government financial reporting for that time:

"It is provided by law that warrants shall be issued by the Secretary or the Treasury in acknowledgement of money received, and that warrants must be drawn by the Secretary of the Treasury for all disbursements of money. These Warrants for expenditures do not represent actual payments but are merely disbursements of credit to disbursing officers who can then issue checks in payment of government obligations."

So either this Warrant represents a payment by a Jacob Waltz or the Warrant is a bill of credit issued to a government officer to pay government bills.

I seriously doubt this, or any other, Jacob Waltz paid the government $7,000. Jacob Waltz was neither a government officer nor even a citizen so this wasn't a warrant for government credit. There was a Jacob Waltz that served in the military during the civil war but he was a dirt farmer with a dozen children by the time this warrant was issued.

I think we can rule out the Superstition Waltz from having anything to do with this warrant.