Coins, Currency, and Medals - Overview
The Museum possesses one of the largest numismatic collections in the world. The collections include over 1 million objects, comprising coins, medals, decorations, and pieces of paper money. Among the many great rarities here are some of the world’s oldest coins, created 2,700 years ago. But the collection also includes the latest innovations in electronic monetary exchange, as well as beads, wampum, and other commodities once used as money. A special strength lies in artifacts that illustrate the development of money and medals in the United States. The American section includes many rare and significant coins, such as two of three known examples of the world's most valuable coin, the 1933 double eagle $20 gold piece.
"Coins, Currency, and Medals - Overview" showing 117 items.
Page 1 of 12
United States, Copper Cent, Pattern, 1792
- Description
- United States Mint, Philadelphia. Obverse: Head of Liberty facing right, unbound hair; date below. Reverse: Value within wreath, fraction (1/100) below. The silver center cent pattern was an attempt to create a cent worth its stated denomination, while doing away with a large, heavy copper coin. The silver plug was inserted to raise the intrinsic value.
- Henry Voigt cut the dies. About a dozen of these coins are known to have been produced. The experiment was abandoned, probably due to the difficulty of manufacture. [reference no. Judd 1]
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1792
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- ID Number
- 1981.1022.0001
- catalog number
- 81.55.1
- accession number
- 1981.1022
- catalog number
- 1981.1022.0001
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
United States, Twenty-Five Cents, Pattern, 1792
- Description
- United States Mint, Philadelphia. Obverse: Head of Liberty facing right, hair bound, date below. Reverse: Eagle standing on globe, head turned back. It is very likely that this was a pattern intended for consideration as a quarter dollar, although some have seen it as an idea for a half eagle. The latter is unlikely, but the size is about right for the ten-dollar piece, or eagle. Joseph Wright designed this pattern. Two specimens are known in copper including this one and two more in white metal.
- [reference no. Judd 12]
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1792
- obverse designer
- Droz, J. P.
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- reverse designer
- Droz, J. P.
- ID Number
- 1991.0357.0121
- accession number
- 1991.0357
- catalog number
- 1991.0357.0121
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
United States, Four Dollars, Pattern, 1879
- Description
- United States Mint, Philadelphia. Obverse: Liberty head with coiled hair, facing left; fineness around, date below. Reverse: Large star, denomination below. This pattern rates a Rarity-6 by experts, suggesting that two dozen or so may exist. [reference no. Judd 1638]
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1879
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- designer
- Morgan, George T.
- ID Number
- NU*283645.1022
- catalog number
- 283645.1022
- accession number
- 283645
- catalog number
- 68.159.0149
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Midura, Edmund, Philadelphia Inquirer, "Future uncertain for Three Coins?" September 19,1926, pp. 16-H
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1976-09-19
- writer
- Midura, Edmund
- original artist
- Gasparro, Frank
- ID Number
- 2009.0005.031
- catalog number
- 2009.0005.031
- accession number
- 2009.0005
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
$20 Pattern Coin, by Augustus Saint-Gaudens
- Description
- United States Mint, Philadelphia. Less than two dozen of these coins were struck. This kind of relief was never intended for a circulating coin, because it took nearly a dozen passes through the press to achieve. We should instead see these marvelous coins as testimony to the human spirit and to human curiosity: just how much relief could you obtain, and how long would it take to create it?
- This ultra high relief twenty has pedigree as well as beauty in its favor. Presdient Theodore Roosevelt gave it to his daughter as a Christmas present in 1907. Augustus Saint-Gaudens had presented it to the president, and it may have been the first piece struck. Roosevelt's daughter donated this coin to the Smithsonian in 1961.
- [reference no. Judd 1778]
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1907
- designer
- Saint-Gaudens, Augustus
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- ID Number
- NU*236191.0001
- catalog number
- NU71628
- accession number
- 236191
- catalog number
- 236191.0002
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
United States, 5 Cents, 1913
- Description
- Some rarities are accidental, like the 1927 Denver double eagle. Others are contrived, beginning their lives as scams. The 1913 Liberty head five-cent piece, or nickel, falls into this category. Were it not for that date, even an advanced collector would hardly give it a second thought. But the date is different, and a very clever set of circumstances ensured that the coins bearing it became memorable, twentieth-century legends.
- The first Liberty head nickels were struck in 1883, their designer the prolific if uninspired Charles E. Barber. Millions were made over the next three decades. The design was to be retired at the end of 1912, and that is when things began to become interesting. Despite orders to the contrary, five new Liberty head nickels were struck clandestinely, presumably at the beginning of 1913.
- Spirited out of the Mint, they came into the possession of one Samuel W. Brown, of North Tonawanda, New York. He eventually became the town's mayor, but earlier had served as Storekeeper of the Mint. At the end of 1919, he placed an advertisement in the Numismatist, offering to pay $500 each for 1913 Liberty head nickels. Later he raised the offer to $600.
- He already had all the coins, so what was he up to? He was making a legend, preparatory to making a profit! He displayed the coins at the following ANA convention (August 1920), finally selling the pieces to a Philadelphia dealer a few years later.
- At this point, San Antonio coin dealer B. Max Mehl entered the picture, also making offers to buy any 1913 Liberty nickels. That did it: everyone from ten-year-old boys to sophisticated collectors began checking their change, hoping to come across another 1913. No one ever did, but the coin's legendary status was assured.
- Date made
- 1913
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- ID Number
- 1977.1199.0001
- catalog number
- 1977.1199.0001
- accession number
- 1977.1199
- catalog number
- 77.49.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
1.00 Dollar, Flowing Hair Dollar, 1794
- Description
- The first silver dollars-and the first silver half dollars-were delivered on the same day, October 15, 1794. Chief coiner Henry Voigt was responsible for 5,300 half dollars that day, and they apparently went into commerce as soon as they were released.
- The dollars were another matter. Precisely 1,758 of them were coined on the fifteenth, and they were immediately delivered to Mint Director David Rittenhouse for distribution to dignitaries as souvenirs.
- The VIPs were not impressed with what they saw. The dollars were struck on the largest press the mint possessed, but the machine was originally intended for cents and half dollars. The only way it had proved adequate for striking the copper pattern was by striking the piece twice.
- The impressions it gave with a single blow were weak, a situation not helped by the fact that the obverse die was damaged early on and had to be polished down along one part of its circumference. This resulted in its making an even weaker impression. So the new federal dollar was not a brilliant success. But it was a first-and sometimes that's success enough.
- Precisely 1,758 of these silver dollars, the first ever minted for circulation by the United States, were coined on October 15, 1794. All were immediately delivered to the Mint Director for distribution to dignitaries as souvenirs. The largest press the mint possessed still was not big enough to give a strong impression with a single blow, hence the weak relief on these coins.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1794
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- obverse designer
- Scot, Robert
- reverse designer
- Scot, Robert
- ID Number
- 1979.1263.00334
- accession number
- 1979.1263
- catalog number
- 01510
- 1979.1263.00334
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Copper Pattern Dollar, 1794
- Description
- Once a new national government had been established under a new Constitution, attention naturally turned to ways of proclaiming national identity. A new, national coinage was one way of doing so, especially if it featured patriotic new images, rather than the endless sequence of crowned monarchs and coats of arms adorning the coinage of Old Europe.
- A U. S Mint Act was passed in 1792, and work was quickly underway. Designs were chosen-a depiction of Liberty for obverses, an eagle, or the value within a wreath, for reverses. The first of the new coins, copper cents and half cents, appeared early the following year. By 1794, mint designers were working to create a silver dollar, the flagship of the new denominations. But they first made a trial piece, in copper.
- Robert Scot created the dies for this design, a Liberty head with flowing hair for the dollar's obverse; an eagle within a simple wreath for the reverse. The new dies to be used in producing silver dollars were tested with a striking in copper. Copper would took a good impression, and would allow Scot and his associates to see whether the dies were cut deeply enough and would therefore be capable of producing the detail wanted on the final silver product.
- Only one piece, this coin, was struck in copper, and it is a unique national treasure.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1794
- mint
- U.S. Mint, Philadelphia
- designer
- Scot, Robert
- ID Number
- 1987.0910.0001
- accession number
- 1987.0910
- catalog number
- 1987.0910.0001
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Flowing Hair Liberty Dollar Plaster Galvano (Model)
- Description (Brief)
- This Flowing Hair Liberty plaster model, designed by U.S. Mint Chief Engraver Frank Gasparro, is an enlarged prototype for the "new mini dollar" of 1978. Gasparro's allegorical Liberty displays a free-spirited young woman similar to the design of Benjamin Franklin's Libertas Americana Medal in 1783 and the cents of 1793—1808. Although the Flowing Hair Dollar design was Gasparro's first choice for the new dollar coin, Congress rejected this design.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1977
- artist
- Gasparro, Frank
- ID Number
- 2009.0005.001
- accession number
- 2009.0005
- catalog number
- 2009.0005.001
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Idea for the Reverse of the New Dollar
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- ca 1977
- artist
- Gasparro, Frank
- ID Number
- 2009.0005.002
- accession number
- 2009.0005
- catalog number
- 2009.0005.002
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center