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This story was submitted to the People War’s site by Amanda Wu of CSV Media on behalf of Leon Baldock and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site’s terms and conditions.

There was a way for us kids to make money during the war when the Yanks were in town.

We used to wait until they got themselves a girlfriend — a dollybird we would say.

Then we would go up to the innocent couple with two half pennies and ask for a penny change for the gas.

The Yanks never understood us — they would ask the girls what we kids wanted. When they found out we wanted a penny, they would put their hands in their pockets, and pull out all their change.

We usually got to pick out the coin we wanted — and we always picked the shillings instead of the pennies — the Yanks had no idea.

Sometimes, they would give us their whole pocketful of change, and we never even had to give up our original two half pennies.

This only worked when a girl was with the Yank — otherwise they wouldn’t bother with us.

Anyway, it worked enough that we could buy ourselves black market sweets.

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