Scrooge's Money Bin

[pollux]

So, let's talk about the bin.

It first appeared in "The Big Bin on Killmotor Hill" by Carl Barks, though it get's destroyed in this story, some catastrophes occur to the bin in other stories, too. Though it's called Scrooge's "new" bin by Donald, in another story, "Modern Times", Scrooge mentions he and his bin are in Duckburg since 70 years. On a map of Barksian Duckburg created by German "Donaldists" (they research the history, society, physics etc. of the Duck universe as if it where real) this is explained by Scrooge having had 20 different bins of which 7 still exist.

According to The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck by Don Rosa, the bin was build in 1902 on Killmotor Hill. Also, it stores only Scrooges money that he made by himself.

Often the bin doesn't only store a vast fortune, but is also the adminstrative center of Scrooge's financial empire or even his home, the latter is popular in Italian comics. Though, in most versions he lives in a mansion. In the new DuckTales show it's even mentioned by one of his "managers" that the money bin is not Scrooge's company HQ, instead he has an office building in the downtown for this.

In my "head canon", the money bin is the place for Scrooge's entire cash fortune, his personal office and the place where he plots new adventures and such. But he lives and sleeps in a mansion like most billionairs do and the real headquarters of his company is a skycraper somewhere in Duckburg's downtown. I also believe that Scrooge build the bin shortly after the arrived in Duckburg and that his appearance caused the city's growth, likely, this was around the year 1900.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

I follow Don Rosa's 1902 date of original building; as for “new” Money Bin, that's precisely where the way it kept being destroyed comes in. With the many robbery attempts against it (both by the Beagles and other criminals), the Money Bin frequently got destroyed, and every time Scrooge would rebuild it according to the original blueprints; but in that debut story he'd decided to give a slightly different design a try, hence why it was a “new” Money Bin.

As to whether he lives there, my take is that while McDuck Manor does exist and he sleeps there in periods of quiet, his business and workaholism often keep him at the Bin until ungodly hours and so he ends up sleeping there quite often. There is ample evidence that it's the headquarters of the McDuck Company; for one thing, Rockerduck is the one with a skyscraper, and Scrooge certainly wouldn't want to do the same thing as him. 

[gadgetphile]

Two things.
1: Are you sure he's only had 20 bins? Cause I seem to recall he had quite a few more.
2: www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-hQf-F3hyU

[pollux]

Jun 20, 2018 9:25:37 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

I follow Don Rosa's 1902 date of original building; as for “new” Money Bin, that's precisely where the way it kept being destroyed comes in. With the many robbery attempts against it (both by the Beagles and other criminals), the Money Bin frequently got destroyed, and every time Scrooge would rebuild it according to the original blueprints; but in that debut story he'd decided to give a slightly different design a try, hence why it was a “new” Money Bin.

As to whether he lives there, my take is that while McDuck Manor does exist and he sleeps there in periods of quiet, his business and workaholism often keep him at the Bin until ungodly hours and so he ends up sleeping there quite often. There is ample evidence that it's the headquarters of the McDuck Company; for one thing, Rockerduck is the one with a skyscraper, and Scrooge certainly wouldn't want to do the same thing as him. 

1. The map is based on Barksian Duckburg only. In the Barks universe, Scrooge used 20 different bins of various designs and 13 of them got destroyed in the matter of time. The map shows where each one was located.

2. I think the bin is a bit to small for the HQ of a global megacorporation. According to Rosa's bluesprints, it's "only" 35 metres high and most of the space inside is taken by Scrooge's money. There are only a few office rooms, to few to administrate such a gigantic company. For that, it would have to be a skycraper ten times that high, filled with office space. Except, though, if he has many small office buildings spread over Duckburg.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Jun 20, 2018 15:35:20 GMT pollux said:

The map is based on Barksian Duckburg only. In the Barks universe, Scrooge used 20 different bins of various designs and 13 of them got destroyed in the matter of time. The map shows where each one was located. 

I frankly don't care for the Donaldists' Barks-only continuity, even if their dedication to it is impressive. But even so, it seems pretty clear that Barks's intention was never for these Bins to have all been different coexisting buildings; he may not have been clear on whether they were different designs of a single building or separate, but there's only ever one big load of cash in one bin, or else a lot of his plots stop making sense.