Next time you hold a five dollar bill in your hand and answer the phone, bear in mind that you have three reminders of great events that took place on March 10th.
That paper money you hold was first introduced in the United States on March 10th, 1862. Up till that point, if you wanted to spend money in the States, it had better be either gold or silver--or it wouldn't go in the cash register. The Confederate states had printed up paper money the year before, and the Thirteen States had made early experiments in paper money around the time of the Revolution, but they had become worthless, so it took 80 years and a Federal Reserve Bank system to inspire enough confidence for Americans to use paper money.
Their confidence wasn't bolstered much by the fact that the fives, tens, and twenties issued on March 10th weren't legally declared tender until a week later.
Another big invention was launched March 10th, 1876. A Scottish tinkerer named Alexander Graham Bell spilled acid in his lab, and called for his assistant to come and help. But instead of yelling into the next room, he picked up an invention of his, the telephone, and used it to summon his assistant. This was the first application of voice over wire technology, and the voice in question growled out in a Scots brogue "Mr. Watson, come here. I want you."
A few decades earlier, a young plains attorney filed a patent for a mechanism to pull grounded boats over sandbars. This was on March 10th, 1849. The mechanism was never put into production, and the inventor never filed another patent, but that didn't stop the patent issued two weeks later from becoming a historic document. The inventor's face ended up on the five dollar bill--but it wasn't for his riverboat buoyancy scheme. It was for his emancipation skills. The inventor was Abraham Lincoln, and that piece of paper on file at the Patent Office gave him the distinction of being the only U.S. president who was also a patent holder.
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