There wasn’t one circulating in the 20th century (though they were still made for the annual Royal Maundy service). There were two experiments with them in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, but they both flopped. One was a massive copper coin and the other was a small silver coin.
https://futureboy.us/fsp/dollar.fsp?quantity=2¤cy=pence&fromYear=1914
‘2 pence in 1914 had the same buying power as 1.02 current dollars.’
Interesting. I’d never heard of this before. (Royal Maundy or Maundy Money or a day called Maundy or the word Maundy.)
I read the first book as an adult, mostly alone in my apartment at 2:00 in the morning. The chapter at the zoo really freaked me out, especially when she spoke with the serpent.
I was surprised at just how different the book was from the Disney movie, which is one of the best memories from my childhood.
Stop using “stone” and then we’ll talk 
Mary Poppins is the first cousin once removed of the Hamadryad.
I’ve also heard that structure was used in upper end clothing shops; the proprietor got the pound and the clerk got the shilling.
I think the point of the movie scene was the contrast of values. The father could think of nothing higher than investing even a trivial amount to put it to work in order to teach his son to do business, while the boy looked to the humanitarian use of contributing to the livelihood of the old woman seller and the birds it benefited.
Travers disliked very much Disney’s treatment of Mary Poppins which is why there was never a sequel (despite Disney’s interest to do so). In fact, she stipulated in her will that any American company be banned from adapting her works to any other medium. There was a movie about it but a lot of incidents were fictionalized and, being a Disney release, it showed Travers being wooed over by Unca Walt in the end but it was ot so.
Well, yes, she was, she let him do the Film. But yes, there were issues and creative differences. She did mention she liked a couple of the songs.
And there is a sequel coming out.
I find it interesting she was so negative after the fact. Disney began negotiating for the rights a long way back (ca. 1938, IIRC). She must have had some idea of what the studio would probably do with it. (And it was planned from the beginning to be a musical.) Why sign them over in the first place if she found that type of treatment so objectionable?
There is oone version that postulates she thought she could get the money but also sabotage the film so it never got made, that she thought she has the right to cancel the film.
Travers said of the film that it was ‘all fantasy and no magic’.
I think you could say that about a large number of Hollywood films, Disney as well as other studios, then and now.
But I have a very hard time thinking of any other film that has “more magic”, in the sense that she appears to mean, than Disney’s Mary Poppins.
Right. But a author often has a hard time letting go. I think time has shown us that Travers was totally wrong and Walt right. His Mary Poppins is a treat, a joy, and a film for the ages.
What ??? I live in a country where they drive on the left side of the road.
You look left first (checking the far side of the road), then look right (the near side) just before you step off the kerb/curb. You might look right/left/right (Hector the cat), but you never look right/left.
If you look left as you step of the curb, you get wiped out by the car you don’t see.
I have to disagree with that. I also live in a country that drives on the left, and I walk a lot and often cross both busy and quiet roads. I always look right first because that is the logical and natural thing to do. Even your video says that.
If the road is very quiet, or you can see down a long stretch where there is no traffic, you might omit looking right a second time, as in the spy example, but looking right first is natural.
“Look right, look left, and right again” was the Kerb Drill in Britain taught to kids from at least 1945 - maybe earlier. See thispublic information film from 1946 (and just listen to the little girls excruciating accent :smack: ) This is the same sequence as the Hector film from Australia. It was finally replaced in 1970 when it was realised kids were using it as a magic incantation and not really thinking about what they saw!
Why would you check the far side of the road first? 
In Canada, I live near an unmarked crossing. Before I step off the curb, I *always *look left first, because I could get splattered immediately if I didn’t. The far side of the road, where the traffic comes from my right, I check second.
Left, right, then left again. I keep my eye on both until I’m clear.
Because you check the near side last.