A long while back, I used a $20 bill to make a $2-and-something purchase. The clerk’s register had no fives or tens. A stack of 17 ones and some coins became change.

Flipping through those 17 one-dollar bills, some were crisp and new, others were wrinkled, faded and dog-eared. There wasn’t an ink mark on any of the ones, though.

It dawned on me that I hadn’t seen a “marked” bill in quite a long time.

And now years later, I still haven’t.

“Marked” bills refer to those dollar bills in which some past holder has scribbled something in blue, black or red ink. Marked bills, in this reference, are the ones where George Washington has been given a bushy mustache or someone has used a pencil eraser to give Abe Lincoln a pair of blank Little Orphan Annie eyes. Or someone has scrawled a cryptic message on a bill or a name or a phone number. Or they have embroidered the bill with doodles, crosshatching, swirls or stick figures.

You never did see these marks on tens, twenties or higher bills, because if the scribble went too far, most people could afford the loss of a buck but who wanted to risk a store not accepting a twenty?

Officially, this marking is called defacing United States currency. Unofficially, these bills have always seemed to be odd little messages passed along from person to person via purchase to purchase. Perhaps, some people mark these bills wondering if some how, some way, some day, one of their doodled bills will return to them? Or maybe a dollar bill is cheaper than a sketch pad or more at hand than a tablet of note paper?

In years past, at least one in a stack of 17 bills would have likely had some kind of mark or scribble on it. It would have likely just been a random bill in a stack of bills. It wouldn’t have been surprising for two or even one or two more bills to contain a doodle or some sort of ink or pencil mark.

But not in this stack. Not a mark on one of those 17 bills. Nope, George Washington’s faces were free of poorly drawn granny glasses, buck teeth, eye patches, Groucho Marx resemblances, mustaches, beards, goatees, hats, blue hair, etc. All 17 of these dollar Georges were in the green of health.

I can’t recall ever drawing on a dollar bill, but I did take a moment to ponder the scribbled bills that passed into my possession. They were like messages in a bottle, without the bother of all that glass, floating along the economic currents. These bills added a subtle shade to the definition of money as currency. But it’s been ages since I’ve seen such a marked bill.

I have a theory as to why fewer bills seem to be marked and scribbled these days. The theory is, surprise, social media. All of those dollar scribblers now post their messages, scribbles, doodles, numbers, etc., on Facebook, etc. 

Though social media makes these messages available to millions of people immediately, I would argue that fewer people read their thoughts. People get on social media and see all of that unbridled information, and think, Gee, ain’t technology grand. It would be the same if all of those old scribbled bills were gathered in one room; most folks would think, Gee, that’s a lot of money.

The message is completely lost.

But not that scribble on that one dollar bill. That message, even if it’s just an ink-drawn grin on George Washington’s face, is noticed one wallet and one purse at a time, as it floats in the currency of commerce.

Dean Poling is an editor with The Valdosta Daily Times and editor of The Tifton Gazette.