Most people born before about 1950 can probably remember visiting or working in shops that had cash carriers – cash balls that ran on wooden rails, wire systems where the carrier was catapulted along an overhead steel wire, or pneumatic tube systems where the carrier was whisked off to the cash office. In the first half of the twentieth century there were thousands of systems in shops in the British Isles, North America, Canada, Australia, South Africa, China and elsewhere. Few now remain in shops but several have been preserved in museums, often in working order, and they bring back many memories for older visitors.