Not sure what this says about the French–or about us–but Collobrières, a village of 1,600 souls in Provence, has started using the franc again, according to this recent piece in the New York Times.

The franc retired, of course, in 2002–when the euro arrived to build, as NYT reporter Steven Erlanger says, “a united Europe.”

And maybe the euro accomplished that, but along the way something went missing: a certain je ne sais quoi, as the French would say–except, in Collobrières, they seem to have a pretty good idea what’s missing.

“We lost something with the franc,” Christine Amrane, the mayor of Collobrières since 2001, told the Times. “We lost an identity. We moved very quickly into Europe, maybe too quickly.”

Writes Erlanger: “While Europeans value the ease of travel that the euro has encouraged, they also think that the new currency caused inflation by allowing merchants to round up costs.”

This is exactly what some Americans say would happen if we retire the penny: haberdashers, blacksmiths, food jobbers would all round up–that, and we’d begin to forget what the side of Abraham Lincoln’s head looked like.

Then there is the matter of national identity. People connect with their money–partly because it’s so sought-after of course, but partly because of how it looks. Nobody likes unattractive money.

” … printed with abstract images of bridges and buildings and with no portraits of anyone, living or dead, euro bills are as faceless as the Eurocrats who run the new Europe,” Erlanger writes.

And so the franc is back in circulation in Collobrières–for a time. The Bank of France “will exchange the last franc bills issued in each denomination until Feb. 17, 2012. Franc coins and older bills, now worthless, are not accepted,” Erlanger notes.

By 2012, the penny may be out of circulation too (it already costs more to make than it’s worth), and who knows what our dollar will be worth. I wonder how we’ll feel about the penny when it disappears.

And what about all those forms of currency which have been pushed into the shadows–the Sacagawea dollar, the Susan B. Anthony dollar, the Eisenhower silver dollar, the $2 bill? Wonder how much longer we’ll be seeing those.

Tags: Bank of France, California, Christine Amrane, civic identity, Collobrières, euro, franc, Long Beach, new york times, Provence, Southern California, Steven Erlanger, The District Weekly, Theo Douglas