Thursday's Internet Edition, August 28, 2008.

Reedy resident Dayton McClung shows off a $10 bill issued in 1912 by the First National Bank of Reedy. McClung bought the rare item last fall at an auction in Marietta, Ohio. DAVID HEDGES/SPENCER NEWSPAPERS

The former president’s portrait is prominently displayed on the front of a $10 bill issued by the long-defunct First National Bank of Reedy, a bill the 78-year-old Reedy resident just had to have.

“I always wanted one of them,” McClung said. “I’d been looking for one for years.”

McClung, a collector of currency, said he saw the bill, which is dated Oct. 18, 1912, advertised as part of an auction in Marietta, Ohio, last fall. A regular at area auctions, McClung traveled to the one in Marietta on a mission.

“Oh yeah, yeah,” he said. “I wanted to get that. I knowed it would go high, but I wanted it.”

The oversized bill, called a “horse blanket” by McClung, is a variety of national currency issued by more than 14,000 banks from 1863 to 1929. Backed by bonds deposited with the federal government, the notes were distributed by banks that had had received a charter allowing them to issue money.

The bank of Reedy opened in 1912, the same date marked on McClung’s bill, and closed in 1944 when it merged with First National Bank of Spencer.

McClung said the Reedy bank was a two-story white brick building situated on Main Street just before the intersection with Middle Fork.

“I used to live right beside of it,” McClung, a lifelong Reedy resident said. “I can just vaguely remember it (as a bank).”

The building was torn down during a flood mitigation project about a decade ago.

McClung remembers his grandfather having several of the Reedy bank notes at one time, but they were spent to purchase lumber during a remodeling project.

“It was just money back then, you know,” he said.

McClung said he has seen similar notes from other national banks, and has collected a few. He knows of no one else that has one of the First National Bank of Reedy variety.

At least two other people were interested in the one he bought at auction. In addition to newspaper advertising, someone had read about the bill on the Internet.

“A car dealer bid against me and another man from New York who had seen it on the Internet said he drove down here to get it,” McClung said. “I think if I’d come that far, I’d bought it, I believe.”

McClung said the New York man told him after losing the bidding that he had gotten a good piece. Value, though, is of little interest to McClung, unless you consider the sentimental kind.

“I don’t reckon,” he said when asked if he would ever have the 1902 series bill appraised. “I’m going to keep it.”

He won’t say for publication how much he paid for the bill, but it’s safe to say that it was a lot more than face value and more than enough to have made President McKinley blush.

“It seems like a feller would be crazy to do something like that for a $10 bill,” McClung said.