That $6 million yearly fee included Tuesday's Fountain Square visit where Ms. Withrow added her signature above her printed name on about 250 of the new $50s.
Her visit - including the currency swap and signing - was part of the Burson-Marsteller agency's $31 million, 5-year Treasury contract to promote a series of new bills.
''Right now, we're running below that on an annual rate,'' Treasury spokeswoman Rebecca Lowenthal said.
Treasury has no public relations - public education staff outside Washington, D.C., Ms. Lowenthal said, so it hired the firm to handle promotions at home and to work with the U.S. Information Agency, which is coordinating foreign efforts.
Two-thirds of the $400 billion in U.S. currency circulates overseas and Treasury is eager to reassure everyone that old U.S. currency is still good, Ms. Lowenthal said. If, for instance, Russians, who hold an estimated $20 billion in U.S. currency, thought old bills were worthless, there would be a panic, she said.
Last year, Treasury introduced a new $100 bill, the most popular denomination overseas. Next year, a new $20 is to be circulated. After that, new $10, $5 and $1 bills will be introduced.
One of the first in line Tuesday to buy the new $50 was Mike Senser of Bridgetown. It took him at least an hour to get Ms. Withrow's signature and he planned to give the $50 to his daughter Jennifer, 10.
Cordie Herring, of College Hill, wanted a signed $50 bill because ''it might be more valuable one day.'' Meanwhile, it might be a gift to granddaughter Laurel Herring, 8.
Barbara Petersen, who has limited vision, praised the design of the new $50. ''It's much clearer,'' Ms. Petersen said. ''The lower right-hand 50 on the back . . . will make it a lot easier to recognize.'' That was no accident. All but the redesigned $100 have a black, large 50 against a light background.
Ms. Withrow, formerly Ohio's treasurer, is visiting five cities to publicize the new currency, carrying $250,000 in new $50s with her. On Fountain Square, the bills were on sale in a special folder, guarded by Cincinnati police and officers from the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and the Federal Reserve Bank.
In part, the new currency responds to increasingly sophisticated computerized scanners and copiers used for counterfeiting, said Paul Lipscomb, acting special agent in charge of the Cincinnati office of the Secret Service.
After the $100, the $50 is the most common bogus bill, he said. The new currency includes features meant to make them harder to fake. Ms. Withrow was unwilling to predict how long it would take counterfeiters to catch up. ''They start working right away,'' she said, ''but we're not going to wait seven decades again to redesign it.''
