Happy Centennial, Cash!

One Tuesday back in 2009 I showed you some little turtles in the drawer of my cash register. In that post I promised more about the cash register in three years time. Now is the time!

Today my cash register is 100 years old!

In August 1994, Jerry and I visited New Mexico. We took a day trip over to Las Vegas. I don't really remember why we went over there. Maybe it was a play day with Peggy. I have no real connection with the town. My parents and older sisters all went to New Mexico Highlands University. I was spared. The only thing I really remember of our trips to Las Vegas to see Jack's Aunt Gladie was our excursions to the nearby Dairy Queen where I'd get a Dilly Bar.

One of our stops on our visit was an antique store on the plaza. They had a bronze National cash register for sale. I was working for NCR at the time and had been wanting to get a cash register. I admired it but decided that it would be too difficult to get it back to California.

Here it is in the antique store.

We went back to Los Alamos without a cash register. The cash register kept calling to me so I decided that we probably could have it shipped. We went back the next day and bought it.

We took it to a business in Los Alamos that ships things. They built a crate with 5/8" plywood, removed the "Amount Purchased" top sign and glass, reinforced the purchase price that was showing (I don't know how to have nothing showing in the amount purchased window) and packed it in foam and styrofoam peanuts. They knew what they were doing. The cash register got here in the same condition we left it.

Its condition isn't perfect but it's pretty good. Its locks are missing their keys. Its Finish C "should be highly polished and clear lacquered with a car quality lacquer, to protect the polished finish" but it's not very shiny.

The people at the antique store told us that they were about its third owners. Its first owner was in Glenwood Springs, Colorado. I think they told me that the son of the first owner used it in a shop in Las Vegas. It then went to the antique store. Now I have it.

I can't find the receipt but the price tag you see in the picture survives.

Ignore the "c 1912"! We know it's actual age!

On the underside of the cash drawer is the guarantee that the cash register will be mechanically correct for two years after it was delivered. It shows that it was built for A. A. Witherspoon of Glenwood Springs, Colorado. It was delivered April 3, 1912.

You'll notice that the Register No. and Size recorded on the guarantee are the same as on the front of the cash register.

This means that this is the original drawer. The cash register isn't cobbled together from pieces!

There is a modification that probably voided the guarantee. The spring that pushes the cash drawer out broke. There is another spring tied to what's left of the original one.

To celebrate my cash register's 100th birthday, here it is making its cheerful Ding! when it registers a sale:

My 100-year-old cash register!