Text│ Xu Bin
Bank staff are using electric money-tying machines
Before there was no banknote, the money-piercing machine naturally had no need to be invented. In ancient times, the hands and ropes used to organize coins were used. The earliest shell coins to the copper coins of the past generations, without exception, have a feature of "surname Kong", whether "Kong Fang Brother" or "Kong Yuanjie", "Kong" gene makes coins easy to sort and carry. Even the shells, which originally had no holes, had to spend effort to grind out the holes, and then five shells were worn in a string, and two strings of shell coins were called "one friend". As for gold and silver currencies, they are either packed on plates or hidden in jars, and there is no problem of whether they are tied or not. Silver coins such as "Yuan Datou" are usually a hundred rolls, wrapped in red paper, which can often be seen on TV.
Metal coins do not exist on the basis of the birth of the banknote machine, so from the emergence of the Song Dynasty to the beginning of the founding of New China, paper money has been used in China for more than a thousand years, why has no one invented a money machine? There are three reasons for this: one is that there were no banks in ancient times, except for the national treasury, most of which were private financial institutions, which were small in scale and did not have a large amount of cash to sort. Just like the general merchants now, there can be a bit of a banknote machine, there can be a pos machine, but there will definitely be no money machine. The second is that in ancient times, silver money was the main standard, and everyone still believed in real gold and silver, and the use of paper money was not widespread enough. The third is that the types of paper money are mixed, and the currency system is not uniform. Although banks have appeared in the Republic of China period, paper money is extremely widely used, but the types of paper money that appear on the market are tens of thousands, the specifications are different, and the money collected by the bank every day may be dozens of kinds, and it is estimated that it is not easy to find a hundred identical coins. So Chinese used money for thousands of years, it wasn't until the 1950s that there was a real machine for bundling money.
The first money-piercing machine on the mainland (left)
Gear-type money-tying machine (right)
The birth of the banknote machine can be described as occupying "the time and place and the people". Although it was the end of the 1950s, it was an indisputable fact that the government attached great importance to development and innovation. After Sino-Soviet relations deteriorated, Soviet experts withdrew from China, so all walks of life carried out technological innovations and developed by self-reliance. The atomic bomb and satellites are needless to say, and the banking industry is no exception, and a large number of banking machines were invented in the context of such an era. The so-called geographical advantage, the birthplace of the banknote machine is Shanghai. Shanghai was the most important light industrial base in China at that time. At that time, as long as the goods such as watches, bicycles, washbasins, and hot water bottles were "MADE IN SHANGHAI", they must have been of good quality. Shanghai's good industrial foundation also makes the birth of the banknote machine have unique conditions. The so-called people, invention and creation are naturally inseparable from the ingenuity and ingenuity of workers. The money-piercing machine brought together a lot of painstaking efforts and creativity of the technicians of the People's Bank of China Tool Factory, because every invention at that time had to announce the good news to the "great leader", but it was not sloppy at all.
There are rules for bank banknotes, one hundred is called one, and ten is a bundle, that is, a thousand banknotes. Listening to the old bank employees, when there is no money tie machine, it is very difficult to bundle up a thousand banknotes, because a handful of banknotes is easy to move, it is time-consuming and laborious to process, in order to press the banknotes, employees can only use their chins to tightly press a bundle of banknotes, and then tie the rope. There are ancient poets who "chant a word and break a few stems and whiskers", and it is estimated that bank employees "tie a bundle of money", and if they are not good, they must also "wear out the skin of their chin".
Electric money tying machine (left)
Hydraulic money tying machine (right)
With the money machine, the work intensity of bank employees is greatly reduced, and the first generation of money machines is called leverage money machines. Leverage is a very "powerful" tool, handed over to Archimedes, even the earth can stand up, handed over to bank employees, bundled banknotes are naturally not a problem. As long as the rope is laid on the groove of the iron block at the bottom of the money tying machine, ten handfuls of money are placed on it, and then the lever is pressed, and the banknote is lifted, pressed, and then the rope is tied, and the chin is finally "turned over and liberated".
However, the first generation of money tying machines still has many shortcomings, such as large size, the operation requires the cooperation of two people, one to suppress the leverage, one to bundle. So various types of money-tying machines have been invented, including hydraulic, gear and so on. These early money-piercing machines are collectively referred to as "mechanical". Up to now a variety of electronic inventions are widely used, semi-automatic, fully automatic money machine has also entered the bank's business process, as long as the money is placed on the money machine, press "start", the banknote will be tied, simply and "wife number" automatic washing machine as considerate.
The official public number of "Shanghai Bank Museum".