Brandt Automatic Cashiers

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Brandt Automatic Cashiers were manufactured beginning in 1899 by the Edward J. Brandt-Dent Company out of Waterford, Wisconsin. The story of its invention is that Brandt, a cashier at the Bank of Watertown (Wisconsin) and a part-time inventor, became annoyed at perpetually sorting and counting change while preparing the payroll for the railroad. The Brandt Automatic Cashier completely eliminates this difficulty with its 100 keys that can instantly produce exact change with the least amount of coins necessary. It can also detect slugs.

Brandt Automatic Cashiers were initially placed in post offices as part of a wide-spread and deeply corrupt postal schemes that took place in the late 1890s to 1902. The cashiers had mixed reviews by local postmasters, some of whom did not think them efficient or necessary.

However, after the scandals, the Brandt Automatic Cashier Manufacturing Company, as it was called starting in 1907, continued to grow. Its products, still related to sorting and counting coins, changed with technological advances. The family sold it in 1984 for $34 million. It has changed hands several times, and, since 2016, has been owned by Glory Global Solutions.

The Brandt Automatic Cashier Manufacturing Company was one of three to test out new coin designs for the federal government, to be sure the coins would work well in automatic and vending machines.

This particular automatic cashier does not have a model number identifying it. In fact, other models with this same configuration and appearance have yet to be found. The models that look the most like this are from early generations of the cashiers. That, and the fact that the casing has “P.O.D.” as part of the casing’s mold, lead us to believe that this machine is one of the original models involved in the scandals.

Coins are placed inside the slots and held in place by spring-loaded ends. The cashier presses the button corresponding to the change needed, and as few coins as possible to make up the correct change fall out the bottom.

To learn more about the Brandt Automatic Cashier scandal, you can watch a short video on the KED.