Carl Sandburg was paid twenty-five cents a week for his first job. Early in the morning he swept the floors and washed the brass spittoons in the Callendar and Rodine Real Estate office on Main Street. In the afternoons, after school, he delivered The Republican-Register to about sixty homes on North Prairie and North Cherry Streets. He received a silver dollar per week for about two and a quarter hours of walking and tossing the newspapers he had folded onto each porch six days a week.

Some of the houses were set back from the street so Carl had to walk to them in order to place the papers on the porches. Sometimes the capitalists and well-known residents of the houses waited on their porches to have the newspaper handed to them directly.

The silver dollar was a hefty coin which represented a hundred cents of pure silver. Congress authorized the production of the dollars in 1792. During the Revolutionary War, there was distrust of the paper money in circulation. Silver coins from other countries, such as Germany and Spain, were used in the Colonial economy.

Silver dollars continued to be minted during the nineteenth century, especially after the western silver mines were opened. Gold dollars were minted after the California gold rush in 1849. The coins were only fifteen millimeters in diameter so were easily lost. The weight of the silver dollar helped individuals know their money was in their pocket.

In the early twentieth century, silver dollars were commonly given as birthday and Christmas gifts. In fact, the United States Mint put more of the coins in circulation to accommodate the custom. The year of 1921 is most often found on silver dollars today. The coins were minted to commemorate the signing of the peace treaties ending World War I. During the Great Depression very few dollar coins were minted.

Between 1971 and 1978, Eisenhower dollar coins were minted with the president's image on the obverse and the Apollo 11 Moon Landing in the reverse. Susan B. Anthony, the famous suffragette appeared on the dollar coin between 1979 and 1981 and again in 1999.

The Sacagawea dollar was first minted in 2000. A new series of presidential coins was begun in 2007 to honor each of our national leaders, but it was suspended in 2011. These are called golden dollars because of their appearance. They are made of an alloy which contributes to the coin's color. Collecting these coins seems to be the main reason for their production.

In recent decades, there has been resistance to using dollar coins. The real dollar coins are too heavy to carry in pocket or purse. The smaller modern dollar coins, such as the Susan B. Anthony, are much like quarters in size which causes confusion when making change. Countries converting from paper dollars to coins have been most successful when the paper dollars were removed from circulation. Lobbying of Congress by vending machine and other interests have kept paper dollars in circulation in the United States.

When young Carl Sandburg received that silver dollar for a week's work, he knew he had a piece of real money. It had size and weight to it. He was expected to gave it to his father to help support the family.