 Producer Essay
The concept behind this project is simple. Everybody has a relationship to money, and most have something interesting to say about it. So you could pretty much stand on a street corner and stick a microphone in peoples’ faces and probably get some good tape on the subject.
But that’s no fun. And it wouldn’t be a random selection of people. It would be the people who I elected to approach.
Better, I thought, to mark up some money and let it randomly float through the economy and land on—who knows? Let the winds of fate decide.
So I found this third generation stamp maker on North Elston Avenue. For $11.60, he made up a sturdy little rubber stamp that reads: Chicago Public Radio (91.5) is tracking this dollar bill. Please call 312-893-XXXX to be interviewed.
See the stamp and marked dollar bills >>
I decided to anonymously insert the money into the economy. In other words I just spent the dollar bills, without explaining to anybody what I was doing.
Distribution of the bills was heavenly. I “Krispy Cremed” and “Dunkin Donuted” my way through fifty city wards and fifty suburbs surrounding Chicago. I gained seven pounds doing this project. No kidding. Seven pounds.
See a list of the suburbs where the bills were dropped >>
I ate seafood gumbo at Lawrence’s Fisheries. Cheese and caramel popcorn at Kozy Kernel. Halva wafers at the Istanbul Market in DesPlaines. A chocolate donut at the Bridgeport Restaurant. I could go on, but I won’t.
Not all the eating was perfect though. When I ordered my “slider” at the Whitecastle in Niles, a 20-something looked up at my mostly gray head and said, “You can get 5 cents off. Do you want the senior discount?” …I paid the FULL PRICE of 47 cents for my hamburger.
 Driving around like this, you come upon spots of incredible interest and beauty, that you didn’t know existed. There’s this decorated house—some person’s highly individualized homage to “Chicago Queen”—Jany Byrne and Rudolpf Valentino. Or the luminous and intimate botanica tucked into a largely residential area. My favorite vista was from the White Palace Grill with the lights of downtown Chicago, splayed out before me.
See some pictures of magical spots >>
 Turns out, you can buy some pretty cool stuff for under a dollar. I got a pair of wine glasses for ninety-nine cents. Plus a night light and a “Got God?” bookmarker. I never realized how many “dollar stores” there are in the city and surrounding suburbs. It’s amazing. They are rampant. Maybe I’m the last person in America to discover that this is an enormous shopping phenomenon.
I also splurged and bought some things for more than a dollar. My favorite is the “money-drawing” soap and air freshener that I got at a botanica on 26th Street.
See some of the “loot” purchased with marked dollar bills >>
Anybody can do this. And on the cheap. Take a hundred bucks and drive to a hundred different neighborhoods and get yourself a cup of coffee. By complete accident, just by following your eye, you will bump into a hundred unbelievable places you never knew existed.
One night I was driving in some unknown western suburb, past the pizza joints, past the CVS pharmacies, and suddenly looming out of the darkness was an ENORMOUS and highly elaborate Hindu Temple. At least I think it was a Hindu Temple. It seemed like a shimmering vision that couldn’t possibly be real. How can carving and architecture like this live in the same neighborhood as a strip mall? If anyone knows where I was, please let me know. But you get the idea. For no money you can go traveling—and right in your backyard.
After the distribution of the bills, it took only a few days before the calls started coming in. They tend to come in fits and bursts. The phone will be quiet for a week or so and then one day, there’ll be several calls waiting for me.
Some of the “Follow the Money” respondents are familiar with public radio, though most are not. One guy recently told me, “As a matter of fact, I AM familiar. I leave it on for my dog at night, sometimes, that station….”
Meeting up with people, of course, has been the best part. Most of the time we rendevous at a coffee shop or fast food restaurant. I bring a list of questions about money—a survey really. And I try to stick to the questions. But usually we veer off course. It isn’t my fault. It’s because people say interesting things that are tangents to the original questions….
When we go through the survey, it feels like we’re in a bubble. Like there’s this fragile membrane around us that is about to evaporate. Probably we’ll never talk again in our entire lives. Probably we’ll never see each other again in our entire lives. It’s just this little moment in time—a conversation, that is going to end sometime soon.
I’m not sure why so many people have agreed to do this. (About twenty-four have met with me so far and more have agreed to…) At first, maybe they think they have won something. But even when they understand there is no prize, many want to complete the survey.
For most participants, I think this project is a curiosity. They want to know where the bill has been and where it’s going. It’s a zap of something new in their lives. And a chance to be heard.
Don’t tell anyone, because this is a RADIO station and all—but in the end, this little experiment/endeavour turns out to be a great web project. It is just straight-out fun to click on a map that shows where the bill was dropped—and then see and hear from the person on whom that bill randomly landed.
I hope you enjoy roaming the pages of this Web site and meeting the interesting folks who, through complete happenstance, obtained one of our floating dollar bills…
Linda Paul
April 20, 2005
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