Chrysti the Wordsmith > Radio Scripts

In the November 12, 1836 edition of the Knickerbocker Magazine, the American author Washington Irving wrote of "...the almighty dollar, that great object of universal devotion throughout our land..." With this statement, Irving reflected the status that had come to be accorded the American dollar.

The word dollar, so familiar to Americans, has its roots in the German language. It comes ultimately from the name of an obscure religious character named St. Joachim who loaned his name to a small silver mining district in Bohemia called Joachimsthal, meaning "the valley of Joachim." The silver from this district was minted into coins called Joachimsthalers, or "of the valley of Joachim." The word was eventually hemmed to thaler, and by 1581 had become the familiar dollar, a sort of generic name for any small coin.

This German based word voyaged to the New World with the Dutch, who introduced, in about 1620, a silver coin stamped with the likeness of a lion. Called the lion dollar, it circulated throughout the colonies until the mid 18th century.

In 1784, Thomas Jefferson suggested the dollar for the basic unit of currency in the new United States. His suggestion became a resolution of the Continental Congress on July 6, 1785.

Radio Script > Dollar