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LANGSTON HUGHES, Pelathe and William S. Burroughs appear, top to bottom on community scrip used in Lawrence, Kan.

Avoiding the tried and true concept of depicting Founding Fathers and other politicians on a community scrip produced for the Lawrence, Kan., area, the issuers instead chose to depict three men from widely different, even controversial, cultures and backgrounds.

A likeness of William S. Burroughs appears on the $3 REAL piece of scrip issued in August 2000. A depiction of the Shawnee scout Pelathe is on the $1 REAL scrip issued in September 2000. Poet Langston Hughes' portrait was used on the $10 REAL currency issued in October 2000.

The scrip is produced for and distributed by the Lawrence Trade Organization, according to John Cougher. The REAL system, Realizing Economic Alternatives in Lawrence, is backed note for note by Federal Reserve notes, Cougher said.

"This assures people that they won't 'lose money' and the interest that the U.S. dollars generate help pay the LTO's operating costs, allows [for] the community donations and zero interest loans," Cougher said. "We've printed approximately $65,000 in REAL notes and if all these were circulating, we would have doubled that amount of money in the Lawrence economy. Basically, we've split the function of money, using the REAL as a circulating medium of exchange and the U.S. notes as a store of value. So our money here in Lawrence can perform both functions simultaneously."

He said the not-for-profit Kansas corporation provides LTO members with 25 REAL dollars per year for an annual membership fee of $25 in Federal Reserve notes. Each member receives a listing in the membership directory and is able to apply for no interest loans in REAL currency to fund start-up and special project costs. Business members agree to accept at least 20 percent of the total purchase in REAL currency and at most, 20 REAL notes per purchase. Members can give the scrip out as wages to employees or as an incentive to employees.

The paper the REAL notes are printed on is made by Crane & Co., the same firm that supplies currency paper to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing used for printing Federal Reserve notes.

The REAL hours are printed on paper made from recycled denim and white cotton fabric. Every REAL note has a unique serial number that is logged by the LTO for verification. Special-order metallic ink, resistant to photocopying, is used as one of the two shades of the note, according to the issuers.

Although the three men depicted on the scrip came from widely different cultures and backgrounds, all have ties to Lawrence.

Hughes, who was born Feb. 1, 1902, in Joplin, Mo., lived in Lawrence from 1903 to 1915. He traveled widely and was among the Harlem Renaissance, a group of new Negro writers, poets and musicians emerging in the 1920s. He was a poet, novelist, playwright and essayist.

Among his works are Not Without Laughter, The Ways of White Folks, The Big Sea, The Langston Hughes Reader, The Selected Poems of Langston Hughes, The Best of Simple, and Five Plays by Langston Hughes.

Hughes died May 22, 1967.

The house where he lived is pictured on the back of the note.

Pelathe made a heroic, although unsuccessful, attempt to warn residents of what would become Lawrence, of an impending raid by William Clarke Quantrill's pro-slavery group known as Quantrill's Raiders. Kansas was a Union state and a stronghold of the abolitionist movement.

The deadly raid took place Aug. 21, 1863, when Quantrill and his force of 450 men killed most of the men and boys in the town and then set fire to much of the city. Quantrill was portrayed as a hero by pro-slavery forces and as a villain by abolitionists.

A scene from the massacre is depicted on the back of the note.

Burroughs, author of Naked Lunch, is credited with being among the "founders" of the Beat Generation of writers and poets of the 1950s. He was born Feb. 5, 1914, in St. Louis. In his early 30s, he traveled to New York where he became a self-admitted heroin addict and pursued a number of other different lifestyles. It was there he met Joan Vollmer Adams, who would become his common-law wife.

Eventually Burroughs moved to Texas to try the life of a farmer and he sent for Adams. She and Burroughs had a son together. While living in Texas, they visited Mexico often and it was on one of those trips with friends that Burroughs announced that he was going to do his "William Tell" act and shoot a glass off Joan's head. Contemporary accounts indicate Burroughs was apparently drunk when he fired the gun and killed her with a single shot. Their son went to live with Burroughs' parents, and Burroughs wandered the world until moving to Lawrence in 1981. He lived there until his death on Aug. 2, 1997. The house he lived in and one of his cats, Ginger, are also pictured on the scrip.

Community scrip - produced by a community for use in that community - has been around since the early 1990s. Credit for the real growth in local money goes to a group in Ithaca, N.Y., that gave birth to the HOURS local currency program. Since 1991, Ithaca HOUR scrip has circulated within a 20-mile radius of Ithaca, known as the "Ithaca Time Zone." An Ithaca HOUR is worth $10 if both the customer and service provider agree.

Collectors can purchase all the Lawrence REAL denominations both as single, serial-numbered notes and as numbered, uncut sheets. There are six notes to the sheet.

Individual notes are available for face value plus $3 for shipping and handling. Prices for the uncut sheets are $15 for the uncut sheet of $1 notes, $25 for the uncut sheet of $3 notes and $65 for the uncut sheet of $10 notes. Add $3 shipping and handling for each sheet ordered.

Send payment with orders to Lawrence Trade Organization, Box 1542, Lawrence, KS 66044, or visit the organization's Web site at http://lto.lawrence.ks.us.