Mister 880

Mister 880 is a 1950 American comedy film about an amateurish counterfeiter who counterfeits only one dollar bills, and manages to elude the Secret Service for 10 years. It was directed by Edmund Goulding, and stars Burt Lancaster, Dorothy McGuire, Edmund Gwenn, and Millard Mitchell, The film is based on the true story of Emerich Juettner, known under the alias Edward Mueller, an elderly man who counterfeited just enough money to survive, and was careful in where and when he spent his fake dollar bills, and was therefore able to elude authorities for ten years, despite the poor quality of his fakes, and despite growing interest in his case. The film was based on an article by St. Clair McKelway that was first published in The New Yorker and later collected in McKelway's book True Tales from the Annals of Crime & Rascality. Edmund Gwenn, who played "Skipper" Miller (only a supporting role in the film), won a Golden Globe Award and was nominated for an Academy Award for his performance. In real life, Juettner was caught and arrested in 1948, and served four months in prison. Juettner made more money from the release of Mister 880 than he had made in his entire counterfeiting career.