what old savings bonds are you cashing in?

[ritchey]

My mom just called laughing gleefully because while cleaning out their shed my parents suddenly stumbled upon an old box full of Kodak slides from before I was born, and in this box were the two savings bonds my Great Aunt Nannibelle gave me when I was born, and which my parents immediately lost, and which my mom has been periodically wondering about for THE ENTIRETY OF MY LIFE. My parents have moved at least three times since the bonds went missing, yet somehow they never turned up. If you know my mom you know this is the kind of thing that drives her crazy--where could they be? Where ARE they? What a waste of money! You know your Aunt Nannibelle didn't have ANY money, that was a big gift from her, etc.--so I am very happy for her that out of nowhere this 43 year old slightly nagging mystery has been solved at last. I cannot tell you how excited she was on the phone. The bonds were supposed to have been cashed out on my tenth birthday, in the year 1987, at which point they were supposed to have doubled. Now it's unclear what, if anything, they are worth. I have to take them to a bank and have some banker examine them, which I'm sure will be hilarious. They are for $25 each and there are two of them. I'm rich!

[m o l l y]

I found some of the self-same things very very recently! Birthday bonds from Mimi! I think there are a couple for 10 dollars and a couple for 25? From like 1982 and 1984? Report back! Fellow messagers, what should we spend our bucks on??

[joni]

Hey one-percenters, here’s a savings bond calculator you can use to view your riches:

https://treasurydirect.gov/BC/SBCPrice

[m o l l y]

I just learned that the $50 bond I got for my birth in 1981 has matured and is now worth $146.

[m o l l y]

I also have 3 from the early 90's that ARE NOT MATURE YET

[meadows]

Nannibelle?!!!!!

[uncleboatshoes]

My grandma used to give out $2 bills for birthdays.
The bills and the grandma are no longer with us.
Her name was Della

[meadows]

Grandmothers have the most beautiful names. Mine were Mardell (from Iowa) and Orene (from Kentucky).

[joni]

My Mom's Mom was named Katherine, we called her Grammie and she went by Kate to her friends. When my parents had the gas station she would make and sell "Kate's Potato Salad" in individual containers.

My Dad's Mom is still with us and everyone (EVERYONE) calls her Bubu. After my grandpa died she remarried a man named PAT CODD. He died in 2002, but sometimes I think of his name and how sounds like a blunt blow. "PAT CODD" He was in the Navy and then in the Astoria Police in the 50s up through the late 80s.

Also, "PAT CODD" feels a little like "PET FISH." Also, a guy named PAT CODD in the Navy is a little funny.

[ritchey]

PET FISH

PLEASE (DON'T) PAT (THE) COD(D)

also re:

Nannibelle?!!!!!

We're Texan!!!! It can't be helped.

Other true names in my family:
Judd
Mavis
Uncle Tag
Aunt Leenie
Uncle Bobo
Roxie
Buck
my mom's college boyfriend "Joe Jack"

[Phil]

It's not exactly a savings bond but my grandpa (name: Phil, army nickname: Flip) got me a CD (a "certificate of deposit" decades ago. One of the last things I did before everything closed down was a pilgrimage to a bank in Everett to cash it out after I'd found the piece of paper in my files.

It was originally purchased for $500 some time the 90s. After decades of earning interest, I cashed it out and got $541. So ridiculous that the result of so much anticipation was $41. I laughed. The banker didn't think it was that funny.

[joni]

I just found an old uncashed check for $300,000 from Arista Records for playing drums on Puff Daddy's song for the OST of the 1998 version of Godzilla

[m o l l y]

That Cannot be true.

[ritchey]

omg LUCKY

[m o l l y]

My grandma used to give out $2 bills for birthdays.
The bills and the grandma are no longer with us.
Her name was Della

We always got $2 bills from Papa Jack! He would carry go to the bank and get small stacks of them to give out as tips because he loved the reactions? or to be remembered? Papa Jack lived to be 104 years old. He weighed something like 104 lbs. Every morning he did a 10 second headstand to "get the blood flowing" and have his "morning mouthwash" which was a shot of tequila.

[rcnederveld]

I have a bunch of savings bonds from the early 80's to the 90's, so waiting for them ALL to mature before I cash in! I just forget about where they are until I come across them, although I probably know exactly where there are if I think about it...

Family names I love:
Minnie Rae (nanny)
Clarence (nanno)
Granny Grunt (nee Joyce, called "sister" growing up)
Celine (grandma)
Guy (great uncle)
Mamère
Papère
Mary Jo (my mom, goes by Jody)
Uncle Bub

[m o l l y]

Jeez Louise, you guys! These names!
As a kid I thought families came from NY. Like when other kids told me their grandma's lived in Oklahoma or that their mom was born in Texas, I was like, why lie to me, kid? Parents come from Brooklyn or maybe Queens and everyone knows this fact to be true.
Still somehow when people say their family members are called Minnie Rae or Uncle Bobo, something deep inside me simply refuses to believe.

[rcnederveld]

Also Grandmother Gilliland, my mom's first name namesake, who I never met but my mom deeply loved. I was raised hearing, "Well as Grandmother Gilliland used to say, you can get glad in the same pants you got mad in".

[m o l l y]

That is beautiful!
How do I pronounce Gilliland? Where did she live?

[meadows]

I'd like some morning mouthwash... right now

[RCH]

I have 3 grandmothers and they are all named Mary (one is from a remarriage). I love everyone's family names, they're so vernacular and charming.

[infopetal]

I think the most intriguing name in my immediate family is my dad's dad. his first name was John aka Jack, but his middle name was ALOYSIUS. "famous warrior!"

(in verifying the spelling, I just learned Aloysius is also the middle name of Pee-wee Herman!)

[yourfriendclaire]

An EPIC name!

I just spent what I’ll call a “Covidian” amount of time reading a Catholic blog post about the life of Saint Aloysius, whose real name (?) was Luigi:

“It was around this time that Luigi began the serious and often severe religious practices that strike contemporary observers as prudish at best and bizarre at worst, especially for a child. It is certainly the main reason that the life of St. Aloysius Gonzaga sometimes repels even devout Catholics today. He fasted three days a week on bread and water. He rose at midnight to pray on the stone floor of his room. He refused to let a fire be lit in his bedchamber even in the bitterest weather. And he was famously concerned with keeping his chastity and safeguarding his modesty. Butler’s Lives of the Saints notes that from as early as age nine, Luigi maintained “custody of the eyes,” as spiritual writers say.“

[yourfriendclaire]

My Grandfather Arthur went by “Bink” all his life because of some childhood resemblance to a popular comic strip character of his youth called “Baby Binkie”

[infopetal]

despite being a (VERY lapsed) catholic, I had to look up the meaning of "custody of the eyes," and I'm interpreting it as the spiritual equivalent of "garbage in garbage out."

[yourfriendclaire]

Great parallel!

Young Luigi/Aloysius did NOT look at any boobs or butts

[m o l l y]

“It was around this time that Luigi began the serious and often severe religious practices that strike contemporary observers as prudish at best and bizarre at worst, especially for a child. It is certainly the main reason that the life of St. Aloysius Gonzaga sometimes repels even devout Catholics today. He fasted three days a week on bread and water. He rose at midnight to pray on the stone floor of his room. He refused to let a fire be lit in his bedchamber even in the bitterest weather. And he was famously concerned with keeping his chastity and safeguarding his modesty. Butler’s Lives of the Saints notes that from as early as age nine, Luigi maintained “custody of the eyes,” as spiritual writers say.“

Reminds me of living with Joel.

[ritchey]

LOL I don't know who Joel is but GOOD ONE

[yourfriendclaire]

Joel is a deeply weird friend of ours from college who deserves his own “tell about”

[m o l l y]

I have reread that description several times by now and there is not one part of it that could not be replaced with Joel. Every last bit. Could Joel have been seen as a visionary saint in the before times??
He DID play the role of Shaman incredibly well. EvanVNSJ, yourfriendclaire, remember when, after Dino-pass to outer space, Joel brought us this tiny bottle of magically not-sweet bubbly cold beverage and we were MESMERIZED by its perfection and begged him to tell us what it was? And after what felt like hours of amazement he finally told us it was Heineken?

[Evan.V.N.S.J.]

It's fun to think about how one day someone might get to be Joel's grandchild

[meadows]

I had a grandpa Aloysious! What a name to be popping up in our lives!
He's from my Irish Catholic side of the family so saint names were a big thing.

My grandma Orene had a brother named Orear, and I feel like these are deeply made up names. She also had sisters Wilma, Velma, and Thelma!

[m o l l y]

Orene, Orear, Wilma, Velma and Thelma???! What was the birth order?

[astral hellion]

My great-great gramma LOVED Benjamin Franklin, and so she named her sons after him:
Benjamin Franklin Kopecki
and
Franklin Benjamin Kopecki
My gramma’s name was Pearl, her sisters were Leona & Francis. She thought the name Pearl was too old-fashioned, so when she was 16 she convinced her dad (Benjamin Franklin) to let her change her name (legally!) to the much more modern SHARON.

[willowowow]

She thought the name Pearl was too old-fashioned, so when she was 16 she convinced her dad (Benjamin Franklin) to let her change her name (legally!) to the much more modern SHARON.

WHAT!?

[m o l l y]

My great-great gramma LOVED Benjamin Franklin, and so she named her sons after him:
Benjamin Franklin Kopecki
and
Franklin Benjamin Kopecki
My gramma’s name was Pearl, her sisters were Leona & Francis. She thought the name Pearl was too old-fashioned, so when she was 16 she convinced her dad (Benjamin Franklin) to let her change her name (legally!) to the much more modern SHARON.

This reminds me why it's great to be alive.

[meadows]

Orene, Orear, Wilma, Velma and Thelma???! What was the birth order?

I can't remember the birth order, but I think there were 10 siblings and this was rural Kentucky, so the naming got p weird!

[morgan]

I just found an old uncashed check for $300,000 from Arista Records for playing drums on Puff Daddy's song for the OST of the 1998 version of Godzilla

Did you know they had the premiere of that movie at MADISON SQUARE GARDEN? And every seat was full. And people came out of it going this is the greatest film ever made, and then a couple weeks later a lot of people were like ya know what never mind I think it was the hype of the stadium.

[rcnederveld]

That is beautiful!
How do I pronounce Gilliland? Where did she live?

Wow so many amazing names happening in this thread!!

Grandmother Gilliland was Austin area, it's also my mom (Mary Jo)'s maiden name. Gilliland is Irish: Gill' * i(short i) * land

[Evan.V.N.S.J.]

I just found an old uncashed check for $300,000 from Arista Records for playing drums on Puff Daddy's song for the OST of the 1998 version of Godzilla

You're not going to believe this, but, ME TOO!

[joni]

I just found an old uncashed check for $300,000 from Arista Records for playing drums on Puff Daddy's song for the OST of the 1998 version of Godzilla

You're not going to believe this, but, ME TOO!

ヘ( ^o^)ノ＼(^_^ )

[m o l l y]

I just found an old uncashed check for $300,000 from Arista Records for playing drums on Puff Daddy's song for the OST of the 1998 version of Godzilla

You're not going to believe this, but, ME TOO!

ヘ( ^o^)ノ＼(^_^ )

^Jona ^EvanVNSJ obvs

[sashaburchuk]

Damn, what a grandma thing to give $2 bills. Rhoda Lee used to hook me up with those all the time.

[freddy]

I totally have a savings bond from my grandmother somewhere. I feel like I saw it recently. I don't really understand what one is!

My great-grandmother was named Ariadne Almedia (and here I got the Most Boring Name around when these beauts were available? THANKS MOM AND DAD). Another great-grandmother, Veronica (called Ronnie), toured with a vaudeville act named the Roberts Sisters (but were not sisters). Here's a photo, and I found some newspaper archives that say:

"The Roberts Sisters and White, tap trio, have applied the feminine touch to the the usual three-men-on-a-pedestal routine to good effect. Gals, whether working singly or in combination, batter out neat cleating of both the standard and sliding variety to good hands all the way. Threesome, working on a raised platform, have an abundance of pep that really puts their stuff across." I might change my Twitter bio to "I have an abundance of pep that really puts my stuff across."



My grandfather grew up touring with her when he was quite young. Then she retired to run a boarding house. She loved playing the ponies, and late in life she met and fell in love with a fellow horse racing enthusiast; he was very rich and together they owned race horses.

My grandma was named Betty Jane Pollard, but when she went to college (UCLA for microbiology in the 1930s?! Hell yeah! Dropped out to have 8 kids tho), they nicknamed her Polly and she went by it for the rest of her life.

[freddy]

Ooh that picture is annoyingly big. Sorry.

[m o l l y]

It is Beautiful.

[willowowow]

God great stories, Freddy!

[ritchey]

I just got the savings bonds in the mail from my mom. They each came in a yellowed envelope printed with eagles and flags, and they say "SHARE IN AMERICA" on them. There's one from 1977 for $50; one from 1977 for $25; and one from 1978 for $50. The website Jona linked to says they've all more than doubled lol! In 43 years they've each gained around $241 in interest. That's NEARLY six dollars a year!!! Thank you President Jimmy Carter, Aunt Nannibelle, and my mom's old boss at the Dallas Public Library!

[m o l l y]

You're rich, socially rich!

[RCH]

Sorry if this is the same site Joni linked, but it's fun to see if you have any unclaimed property: https://unclaimed.org

My mom took out a Gerber Baby insurance program for me once, but unceremoniously cashed it out to pay bills.

Freddy, you could definitely be an Ariadne!