From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!ihnp4!ihuxm!prgclb
Newsgroups: net.misc
Title: Re: Do we need to buy checks?
Article-I.D.: ihuxm.147
Posted: Thu Jan  6 14:33:32 1983
Received: Fri Jan  7 03:43:41 1983
References: rocheste.369


It used to be true that any medium (e.g. napkins) would serve
as a check, until the Federal Reserve
(sometime in the 1960s) required that any checks
it handled needed to be magnetically encoded.

Try printing magnetic numbers on your napkin!

Seriously, I remember as a kid when my parents went
to a store without their checkbook and bought more than
they had cash for, they'd ask the cashier for a blank check.

It was simply a piece of paper that asked you to
fill in the name and address of your bank, plus all
the other typical stuff (pay to the order of, amount, signature).

In this day and age, where you have to get fingerprinted,
photographed, blood-typed, etc to use checks that already
have your phone number, social security number, address, etc,
it's hard to believe the trusting practices of an earlier era!

				Carl Blesch
				Bell Labs - Indian Hill
				Naperville, Ill.
				ihuxm!prgclb