Tchaikovsky's impressions of the American treasury

Tchaikovsky's diaries ^ | 5/1/1891 | Peter Tchaikovsky

[Borges]

New York, 1 May 1891 — "Then Mayer procured permission for me to see the vaults of the public treasury, where hundreds of millions in gold, silver, new banknotes and security bonds are stored. Exceptionally obliging yet important officials guided us to these vaults, opening the monumental doors to this mysterious castle, with an equally mysterious spinning of metal knobs. Bags of gold rested like sacks of flour in a barn, in beautiful, clean, electrically-illuminated chambers. I was given a stack of new banknotes worth 10 million dollars to hold. Finally I understood why gold and silver are not in circulation; only now did this odd fact become apparent to me. It turns out that the American prefers dirty, disgusting scraps of paper to metal, finding them more convenient and practical. But these notes are, unlike ours, worth more than gold and silver, thanks to the enormous amount of precious metal stored in the treasury"

[Borges]

The Russian composer visited America to help open Carnegie Hall. These observations are amusing. The site linked has been serializing these diary entries on their Facebook page.

[BerniesFriend]

Tchaikovsky's impressions of the American treasury

Tchaikovsky did not do impressions. He was a composer.

[Skooz]

BFL.

Get to see, for the first time, his amazing violin concerto performed live tomorrow night. Can’t wait.

[IronJack]

"Peter Ilyich Tchaikovky. Was he the tortured soul who poured out his immortal longings into dignified passages of stately music, or was he just an old poof who wrote tunes?”

-- Monty Python

[dadfly]

good post. i see his intellect, his teachability, transcended his music.

[MarchonDC09122009]

Insightful observance of his well founded distrust of fiat money.
Wonder what he’d now think?
America becoming one of the largest debtor nations.
Our treasury no longer bothers to hold significant amounts of gold & silver.
Fractional bank reserve deposit policies that are so fragile, a depositor withdrawing more than $5000, gets hassled by their bank and reported to the DOJ as suspicious.
Evergrowing multi-trillion dollar national debt 18T+
Quadrillion dollar derivatives house of cards.
Ironic that his Russia is attempting to position itself for global economic calamity by filling it’s coffer ‘ s with as much gold as they can obtain?
Fundamentally transform us, indeed.

[DoodleDawg]

bfl