Coins, Currency, and Medals

The museum possesses one of the largest and most diverse numismatic collections in the world. Its diverse holdings represent every inhabited continent and span more than three millennia. The collection includes coins, paper money, medals, tokens, commodity and alternative currencies, coin dies, printing plates, scales and weights, financial documents and apparatuses, credit cards, and objects that reflect established and emerging digital monetary technologies worldwide.

Patterns and experimental pieces form one of the most interesting groups of specimens associated with official coinage. It was customary for the Mint to provide samples of a proposed coin. More patterns were made in 1877 than in any other year.
Description
Patterns and experimental pieces form one of the most interesting groups of specimens associated with official coinage. It was customary for the Mint to provide samples of a proposed coin. More patterns were made in 1877 than in any other year. The Gold Rush in California prompted the merchants and bankers in San Francisco to lobby Congress for gold pieces of high denomination for quick counting purposes when a branch mint was established in their city in 1854. The design for the proposed large coin was similar to the $20 double eagle. Senator William Gwin of California introduced a bill for the adoption of this coin. His bill passed the Senate but failed to win approval in the House of Representatives. Although the coin was not approved, the proposal for such a large coin was feasible only after enough of the precious metal was available with the discovery of vast quantities in California. The depiction of Liberty on the obverse was a familiar symbol of national identity by 1877 for Americans.
date made
1877
maker
U.S. Mint
designer
Barber, William
ID Number
1986.0836.0060
accession number
1986.0836
catalog number
1986.0836.0060
One (1) 10 dollar coinUnited States, 1830Obverse Image: N/AObverse Text: GEORGIA GOLD / 1830Reverse Image: N/AReverse Text: TEMPLETON REID ASSAYER / TEN DOLLARSBefore the famous California gold rush, several important strikes were made in the East: in North Carolina, South Caroli
Description (Brief)
One (1) 10 dollar coin
United States, 1830
Obverse Image: N/A
Obverse Text: GEORGIA GOLD / 1830
Reverse Image: N/A
Reverse Text: TEMPLETON REID ASSAYER / TEN DOLLARS
Description
Before the famous California gold rush, several important strikes were made in the East: in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. The earliest took place in Mecklenburg County, N.C., in 1799, where a nugget weighing several pounds was discovered. Its finder used it as a doorstop until someone recognized it for what it was! Discoveries multiplied, and a federal branch Mint was eventually set up in Charlotte to process the metal into coinage.
Discoveries in Georgia and North Carolina in the 1820s received wide publicity, and a "gold fever" resulted. Thousands of people began trekking to the areas in search of instant wealth. Most returned home empty-handed, but successful prospectors found millions of dollars' worth of precious metal.
What should they do with their new wealth? Many felt the Philadelphia Mint was too far away for safe travel, and the government wasn't ready to create other coining facilities. A jack-of-all-trades named Templeton Reid had an answer: strike private gold coins, at a private mint. Reid had extensive experience as a watchmaker, gunsmith, and metalworker. In July 1830, he set up shop in the Georgia hamlet of Milledgeville and began his brief career as private moneyer-the first since Ephraim Brasher.
He later moved to Gainesville, which was closer to the gold mining district. His coins came in three denominations: ten dollars, five dollars, and two and one-half dollars, in recognition of "official" denominations. And he put slightly more gold into his products than the federal government did into its coins, just to be on the safe side.
Although historians believe that Templeton Reid conducted business fairly, an unknown adversary, signing himself simply "no assayer," published several notices in newspapers complaining that the coins were not as represented.
Rumors spread and before long Reid was forced to close up the business.
date made
1830
maker
Reid, Templeton
ID Number
NU.68.159.1185
accession number
283645
catalog number
68.159.1185
One (1) 50 dollar coinUnited States, 1851Obverse Image: Eagle standing on a rock, holding a shield, with a ribbon in its beak.Obverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / AUGUSTUS HUMBERT UNITED STATES ASSAYER OF GOLD CALIFORNIA / 1851 / 887 THOUS / FIFTY DOLLSReverse Image: Engine-t
Description (Brief)
One (1) 50 dollar coin
United States, 1851
Obverse Image: Eagle standing on a rock, holding a shield, with a ribbon in its beak.
Obverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / AUGUSTUS HUMBERT UNITED STATES ASSAYER OF GOLD CALIFORNIA / 1851 / 887 THOUS / FIFTY DOLLS
Reverse Image: Engine-turned design.
Reverse Text: N/A
Description
As early as 1850, agitation began in Congress for the establishment of a San Francisco branch of the United States Mint. This action was blocked by people from New York-who wanted a branch in their own state-and from Georgia and Louisiana-who argued that any California operation would represent unfair competition to the branch mints in Dahlonega and New Orleans.
The opposition won, and San Francisco would go without a mint for another four years. But it did get an odd sort of hybrid, the United States Assay Office of Gold, striking an odd sort of money-a gigantic, fifty-dollar ingot that would also do duty as a coin. The arrangement was made by the Treasury Department under a contract with Moffat & Company, private assayers and gold coiners in San Francisco.
Augustus Humbert came west to oversee the operation, which got under way at the end of January 1851. For most of the next two years, Humbert's fifty-dollar "slugs" were the principal accepted currency in California. He was eventually allowed to turn his attentions to the production of smaller, and altogether more useful, coins, ten- and twenty-dollar pieces. And his operation finally laid the framework for a formal, normal branch Mint, which began the production of ordinary federal coinage in the spring of 1854.
date made
1851
mint
United States Assay Office of Gold
ID Number
NU.68.159.1142
accession number
283645
catalog number
68.159.1142
In 1848, the largest single gold rush in history was just getting under way in California. This event soon triggered a mass migration of fortune hunters from around the world.
Description
In 1848, the largest single gold rush in history was just getting under way in California. This event soon triggered a mass migration of fortune hunters from around the world. At the outset, much of the California gold was converted to coins by private minters in the San Francisco area. However, supplies of gold were also sent to Philadelphia where the metal was turned into ordinary federal coins.
Smaller quantities of gold made it to various locations including Oregon. Between March and September, 1849, an entity calling itself the Oregon Exchange Company struck $10 and $5 coins, by hand, in Oregon City. Both denominations bore simple designs. Their obverses depicted a beaver, the fur-bearing mammal that had spurred the first interest in the region. Above the animal, there were initials standing for the last names of the principal players in the operation.
The initials O.T. or T.O. (both for Oregon Territory) and the date rounded out the obverse design. For the reverse, the name of the issuing authority and the denomination sufficed. Scholars believe that around 2,850 of the $10 coins were made. Dies for them can still be seen at the Oregon Historical Society in Portland.
But the life of the Oregon mint was brief. The coiners set their products' weight above federal norms, and most of the Oregon coinage was melted down for profit. The mint ceased operation early in September 1849.
date made
1849
maker
United States Mint
Oregon Exchange Company
ID Number
1985.0441.2216
catalog number
1985.0441.2216
accession number
1985.0441
Someone once observed that a giraffe was a horse designed by a committee.
Description
Someone once observed that a giraffe was a horse designed by a committee. The same might be said of this coin: what had seemed a good idea around a table in the boardroom proved to be an interesting but spectacular flop as it neared production.
The coin resulted from a project that President Theodore Roosevelt began in 1905 to redesign American coinage. He commissioned sculptor August Saint-Gaudens to create the new designs, and Saint-Gaudens developed a plan for an ultra-high relief $20 coin. The coin here, which appears to have been struck early in 1907, followed Saint-Gaudens' basic designs, but there the similarities ended.
This experimental coin contained twenty dollars' worth of gold, but it was squeezed into a coin the width of a ten-dollar piece. The discrepancy was handled by making the patterns much thicker than ordinary coins. Staff at the Mint wondered whether it was possible to decrease the diameter to have the best of both worlds: a coin in glorious high relief that didn't take quite as many blows of the press to create. The experiment failed. Although the patterns were unacceptable for commerce, word of their existence leaked out to the collecting community. An exasperated Mint Director wanted them called in and melted down. Somehow two escaped. Both are in the Smithsonian Collection.
date made
1907
designer
Saint-Gaudens, Augustus
ID Number
1985.0441.2099
accession number
1985.0441
catalog number
1985.0441.2099
One (1) 50 dollar coin, patternUnited States, 1877Obverse Image: Left-facing Liberty wearing a coronet. 13 stars.Obversre Text: LIBERTY / 1877Reverse Image: A modified heraldic eagle with a shield over chest, holding a double scroll, clutching arrows and branch.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 50 dollar coin, pattern
United States, 1877
Obverse Image: Left-facing Liberty wearing a coronet. 13 stars.
Obversre Text: LIBERTY / 1877
Reverse Image: A modified heraldic eagle with a shield over chest, holding a double scroll, clutching arrows and branch. Rays and stars above eagle.
Reverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / FIFTY DOLLARS / IN GOD WE TRUST / E PLURIBUS UNUM
Description
Some twenty years after the private sector had abandoned the idea of a fifty-dollar gold piece in the mid-1850s, the Philadelphia Mint considered the possibility of a federal coin of this denomination. There was even talk of a "union," or hundred-dollar coin, and a drawing or two has survived to suggest what the Mint had in mind. But in the end, no such coin was ever produced.
The project went a bit farther in the case of the "half-union." Dies were prepared, the work of William Barber (father of the eventual Mint Chief Engraver Charles E. Barber).
Barber's obverse and reverse designs look vaguely akin to Longacre's work for the double eagle. A few patterns were struck in copper and two in gold; the latter share a reverse die but each has a slightly different obverse die. The project was abandoned soon afterwards, as it became apparent that the new coin simply wasn't needed.
date made
1877
maker
U.S. Mint
designer
Barber, William
ID Number
1986.0836.0059
accession number
1986.0836
catalog number
1986.0836.0059
A decade or so after the California Gold Rush began in the late 1840s, gold was discovered on the South Platte River, near the future city of Denver.
Description
A decade or so after the California Gold Rush began in the late 1840s, gold was discovered on the South Platte River, near the future city of Denver. As with the earlier strike, this one occasioned disputes over the value and purity of gold dust, as well as great difficulties in getting the precious metal all the way to Philadelphia to be coined there, and shipped back again.
Matters would be greatly simplified if a coiner, either private or public, could set up shop near the gold fields. A good candidate existed-Clark, Gruber & Co. Up to now, the firm had acted as brokers, bankers, and assayers. But if a coinage was wanted, Austin and Milton Clark and Emmanuel Gruber were up to the challenge and had the resources to do it right.
Milton Clark went back East to get the necessary machinery, three lots were purchased in Denver, and a two-story brick building soon went up on the property. Trial strikes of the four denominations to be coined ($2.50, $5, $10, and $20) were ready for inspection by mid-July 1860, and formal coinage began about a week after that.
One of the firm's most famous products showed a marvelous, if unrealistic, image of Pikes Peak, beneath which Denver-and the Clark, Gruber enterprise-sat. The facility remained in operation through 1862, although all of its coins were dated 1860 and 1861. It was elbowed out of the coining business in April 1863. It turned first into a federal assay office, then 43 years later, into another branch of the United States Mint.
date made
1860
mint
Clark, Gruber & Co.
ID Number
1985.0441.2226
catalog number
1985.0441.2226
accession number
1985.0441
If you look very closely at the reverse of this, the sole remaining "class two" 1804 dollar, you will discern a slight shifting of the relationship between the clouds and the lettering above them.This discrepancy, which distinguishes it from the "class one" and "class three" 1804
Description
If you look very closely at the reverse of this, the sole remaining "class two" 1804 dollar, you will discern a slight shifting of the relationship between the clouds and the lettering above them.
This discrepancy, which distinguishes it from the "class one" and "class three" 1804 dollars, suggests that a new reverse die was employed to strike the coin. This new die was necessary because the old one had either been broken, rusted, or simply discarded after the coinage of 1834, when the class one dollars were struck.
This coin was made a quarter-century later, by a group of enterprising coiners who had decided to go into the rarities business. In addition to making a new die, these midnight coiners had to have stock on which to use it. Instead of following the usual procedure of rolling out a strip of metal to the correct thickness, then blanking it to the correct size-a difficult and expensive process, they decided to start with an existing coin and overstrike it with the new die. That way the new coin would be of about the right weight and thickness. This coin shows traces of the original design: it began its life as a Swiss thaler dated 1857!
When word got out about what was going on, the Mint Director swooped down on the miscreants. All their coins but this one were retrieved and ordered melted down. It remains: a somewhat tarnished, but still legendary rarity.
date made
1804
mint
U.S. Mint (unauthorized)
ID Number
1986.0836.0062
catalog number
1986.0836.0062
accession number
1986.0836
One (1) Nova Constellatio coinEngland, 1783Obverse Image: All-seeing eye of God surrounded by rays and stars.Obverse Text: NOVA CONSTELLATIOReverse Image: Wreath.Reverse Text: LIBERTAS JUSTITIA / 1783 / U.SCurrently not on view
Description (Brief)
One (1) Nova Constellatio coin
England, 1783
Obverse Image: All-seeing eye of God surrounded by rays and stars.
Obverse Text: NOVA CONSTELLATIO
Reverse Image: Wreath.
Reverse Text: LIBERTAS JUSTITIA / 1783 / U.S
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1783
ID Number
1991.0009.0110
catalog number
1991.0009.0110
accession number
1991.0009
This fifty dollar octagonal gold coin—also known as a “slug”—was produced in 1851 in San Francisco.
Description
This fifty dollar octagonal gold coin—also known as a “slug”—was produced in 1851 in San Francisco. After the California gold rush began in 1849, it became apparent that a mint should be established on the West Coast to remove the need to ship the gold back to Philadelphia to be minted. Prior to Congress approving the San Francisco mint in 1852, California’s delegates passed a bill in 1850 establishing the U.S. Assay Office to assay (weigh and test purity of) gold and mint coins in San Francisco. Augustus Humbert was appointed to serve as the U.S. Assayer in San Francisco. He brought dies engraved by Charles C. Wright to produce coins made by Moffat & Company. On the obverse, or front, of the coin is a spread-winged eagle on the U.S. shield resting upon a rock; in its claws are an olive branch and arrows. Above the eagle is a cartouche containing the coin’s degree of fineness, in this case 887 thousandths. Within the circle is the text “United States of America/FIFTY DOLLS.” Around the edge are the words “Augustus Humbert United States Assayer of Gold California 1851.” On the reverse is a spiral pattern created by and known as “engine turning.”
date made
1851
mint
United States Assay Office of Gold
maker
Humbert, Augustus
ID Number
NU.68.159.1192
catalog number
68.159.1192
accession number
283645
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1723
designer
Wood, William
ID Number
1988.0063.0031
accession number
1988.0063
catalog number
1988.0063.0031
One (1) solidus coin, Constantine VIByzantine Empire, 780 - 797Obverse Image: Portrait busts of Constantine VI, beardless, and Irene to his right; both are crowned with cross between their heads; Constantine VI wears chlamys and holds globus cruciger in right hand, his mother wea
Description (Brief)
One (1) solidus coin, Constantine VI
Byzantine Empire, 780 - 797
Obverse Image: Portrait busts of Constantine VI, beardless, and Irene to his right; both are crowned with cross between their heads; Constantine VI wears chlamys and holds globus cruciger in right hand, his mother wears a loros and holds a cruciform scepter in left hand ; pellet in field between their faces.
Obverse Text: CONSTANTINOS / CA / b
Reverse Image: Leo III, Constantine V and Leo IV seated facing front, each wearing crown and chlamys.
Reverse Text: IRIHI / AVG / MITRI / AV
Location
Currently not on view
date made
780 - 797
maker
Constantine VI Emperor of Byzantium
ID Number
NU.68.159.6090
catalog number
68.159.6090
accession number
283645
This coin is one of the type sent to the United States at James Smithson's bequest for the creation of the Smithsonian Institution.
Description
This coin is one of the type sent to the United States at James Smithson's bequest for the creation of the Smithsonian Institution. James Smithson was born in 1765 as the illegitimate son of Sir Hugh Smithson, later known as Sir Hugh Percy, Baronet, 1st Duke of Northumberland, K.G., and Elizabeth Hungerford Keate.
Elizabeth Keate had been married to James Macie, and so Smithson first bore the name of James Lewis Macie. His mother later married Mark Dickinson, by whom she had another son. When she died in 1800, he and his half-brother inherited a sizable estate. He changed his name at this time from "Macie" to "Smithson."
James Smithson died June 27, 1829, in Genoa, Italy. His will left his fortune to his nephew, son of his half-brother, but stipulated that if that nephew died without children (legitimate or illegitimate), the money should go "to the United States of America, to found at Washington, under the name of the Smithsonian Institution, an establishment for the increase and diffusion of knowledge among men."
The nephew, Henry Hungerford Dickinson, died without heirs in 1835, and Smithson's bequest was accepted in 1836 by the United States Congress. Smithson never visited the United States, and the reason for his generous bequest is unknown. The gift was the foundation grant for the Smithsonian Institution.
The Smithson bequest consisted of 104,960 gold sovereigns. Presumably they all bore the head of the new Queen Victoria, who had acceded to the throne in 1837.
The United States insisted on new sovereigns rather than circulated ones for a very practical reason: the United States would get more gold that way. The U.S. Mint subsequently melted these coins down to reuse the gold.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1838
ruler
Victoria Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and Empress of India
maker
American Type Founders Company
Great Britain
ID Number
1985.0441.1579
catalog number
1985.0441.1579
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 10 dollar coinUnited States, 1849Obverse Image: Emblem of Mormon Priesthood: 3-pointed Phrygian Crown above all-seeing eye.Obverse Text: TO THE LORD HOLINESSReverse Image: Clasped hands.Reverse Text: PURE GOLD / TEN DOLLARS / 1849Eagles with these designs were probably th
Description (Brief)
One (1) 10 dollar coin
United States, 1849
Obverse Image: Emblem of Mormon Priesthood: 3-pointed Phrygian Crown above all-seeing eye.
Obverse Text: TO THE LORD HOLINESS
Reverse Image: Clasped hands.
Reverse Text: PURE GOLD / TEN DOLLARS / 1849
Description
Eagles with these designs were probably the first coins struck at the mint established by the Mormons. They were made from unalloyed gold, and no more than ten are known. The source of their metal was California. Mormon miners brought the gold home with them in the form of dust when they returned to Utah.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1849
maker
Mormon Mint
ID Number
1985.0441.2219
catalog number
1985.0441.2219
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 10 dollar coinUnited States, 1860Obverse Image: Pikes Peak mountain.Obverse Text: PIKES PEAK GOLD / TEN D. / DENVERReverse Image: Heraldic eagle with shield clutching arrows and olive branch.Reverse Text: CLARK GRUBER & CO.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 10 dollar coin
United States, 1860
Obverse Image: Pikes Peak mountain.
Obverse Text: PIKES PEAK GOLD / TEN D. / DENVER
Reverse Image: Heraldic eagle with shield clutching arrows and olive branch.
Reverse Text: CLARK GRUBER & CO. / 1860
Description
Austin Clark and his brother Milton joined forces with a merchant named Emanuel Gruber to create the most successful private coiner in Jefferson Territory (today's Colorado), Clark, Gruber & Co. The partners had enough resources among them to ensure that any mint they set up would have the best in modern machinery and metallurgy. While Milton Clark hurried back east to purchase dies and presses in New York and Philadelphia, Austin Clark and Emanuel Gruber stayed behind, purchasing three lots in Denver City and erecting a fine brick building for a fine new territorial mint.
Coining got under way in July 1860. The first pieces struck featured one of two designs. For quarter and half eagles, the designs of regular federal coinage were carefully copied: Liberty head on the obverse, eagle on the reverse. For the larger denominations, the eagle and double eagle, a radical departure was offered, at least for the obverse. An inaccurate representation of Pike's Peak graced that side, along with a description of the origin of the gold contained in the coins, and the name of the place where they were struck. This was the first Denver mint mark, and the most complete as well.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1860
maker
Clark, Gruber & Co.
ID Number
1985.0441.2227
catalog number
1985.0441.2227
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 20 dollar coinUnited States, 1849Obverse Image: Emblem of Mormon Priesthood: 3-pointed Phrygian Crown above all-seeing eye.Obverse Text: TO THE LORD HOLINESSReverse Image: Clasped hands.Reverse Text: G. S. L. C. P. G.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 20 dollar coin
United States, 1849
Obverse Image: Emblem of Mormon Priesthood: 3-pointed Phrygian Crown above all-seeing eye.
Obverse Text: TO THE LORD HOLINESS
Reverse Image: Clasped hands.
Reverse Text: G. S. L. C. P. G. / TWENTY DOLLARS / 1849
Description
Not all of the California gold was turned into coins in California. Some of it went north, where it was minted into currency by the Oregon Exchange Company. And some of it went east, to Utah Territory, carried home by Mormon miners who left the cities of Sacramento and San Francisco for Salt Lake City.
On Brigham Young's orders, a mint was set up to turn the California dust into Utah coins. One of the prime movers in the new venture was a British convert named John Mobourn Kay. Kay forged the die blanks, engraved the dies, and, for good measure, helped in the selection of their designs.
The first Mormon coins, eagles, appeared in December 1848-the very first American pioneer coins struck west of the Mississippi. Other denominations were soon added. All of them, including the double eagle on display, have radical design concepts unseen before or since. The coin on display was among the first double eagles ever struck and circulated in the United States. The obverses of these coins bore the emblem of the Mormon Priesthood, a three-pointed crown above an All-Seeing eye. The reverse displayed clasped hands, joined in friendship and solidarity, the badge of a new people stressing unity and welcoming newcomers. Few of these early Utah coins have survived. Most were melted down in the early 1850s. The Smithsonian coin is one of the finest known.
date made
1849
mint
Mormon Mint
ID Number
1985.0441.2218
catalog number
1985.0441.2218
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 5 dollar coinUnited States, 1849Obverse Image: Beaver on log, branches below.Obverse Text: K.M.T.A.W.R.G.S. / T.O. / 1849Reverse Image: N/AReverse Text: OREGON EXCHANGE COMPANY / 130 G. / NATIVE GOLD.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 5 dollar coin
United States, 1849
Obverse Image: Beaver on log, branches below.
Obverse Text: K.M.T.A.W.R.G.S. / T.O. / 1849
Reverse Image: N/A
Reverse Text: OREGON EXCHANGE COMPANY / 130 G. / NATIVE GOLD. / 5 D.
Description
In 1848, the largest single gold rush in history was just getting under way in California. This event soon triggered a mass migration of fortune hunters from around the world. At the outset, much of the California gold was converted to coins by private minters in the San Francisco area. However, supplies of gold were also sent to Philadelphia where it was made into ordinary federal coins.
Smaller quantities of gold made it to various locations including Oregon. Between March and September, 1849, an entity calling itself the Oregon Exchange Company struck $10 and $5 coins, by hand, in Oregon City. Both denominations bore simple designs. Their obverses depicted a beaver, the fur-bearing mammal that had spurred the first interest in the region.
Above the animal, there were initials standing for the last names of the principal players in the operation. The initials O.T. or T.O. (both for Oregon Territory) and the date rounded out the obverse design. For the reverse, the name of the issuing authority and the denomination sufficed. Dies for the coins can still be seen at the Oregon Historical Society headquarters in Portland.
But the life of the Oregon mint was brief. The coiners set their products' weight above federal norms, and most of the Oregon coinage was melted down for profit. The mint ceased operation early in September 1849.
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1849
maker
Oregon Exchange Company
ID Number
1985.0441.2217
catalog number
1985.0441.2217
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 5 dollar coinUnited States, 1860Obverse Image: Liberty wearing a coronet. Stars around.Obverse Text: CLARK & CO.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 5 dollar coin
United States, 1860
Obverse Image: Liberty wearing a coronet. Stars around.
Obverse Text: CLARK & CO. / 1860
Reverse Image: Eagle with shield over chest clutching arrows and branch.
Reverse Text: PIKES PEAK GOLD DENVER / FIVE D.
Description
Produced by the Clark, Gruber & Company's mint, Denver, Colorado. For its half eagles, Clark, Gruber & Co. abandoned the Pikes Peak motif that it used on its larger coins. The company brought the designs for the five dollar pieces into conscious imitation of regular United States coins.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1860
mint
Clark, Gruber & Co.
ID Number
1985.0441.2228
catalog number
1985.0441.2228
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 10 dollar coinUnited States, 1849Obverse Image: Beaver on a log. Branches and stars.Obverse Text: K. M. T. R. C. S. / O.T. / 1849Reverse Image: N/AReverse Text: OREGON EXCHANGE COMPANY / 10.D. 20.G. / NATIVE. / GOLD. / TEN. D.Currently not on view
Description (Brief)
One (1) 10 dollar coin
United States, 1849
Obverse Image: Beaver on a log. Branches and stars.
Obverse Text: K. M. T. R. C. S. / O.T. / 1849
Reverse Image: N/A
Reverse Text: OREGON EXCHANGE COMPANY / 10.D. 20.G. / NATIVE. / GOLD. / TEN. D.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1849
maker
Oregon Exchange Company
ID Number
NU.68.159.1175
accession number
283645
catalog number
68.159.1175
One (1) 20 dollar coin, proofUnited States, 1890Obverse Image: Liberty wearing a coronet and facing left. 13 stars around.Obverse Text: LIBERTY / 1890Reverse Image: Heraldic eagle with wings outstretched clutching arrows and branch in talons, shield over chest.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 20 dollar coin, proof
United States, 1890
Obverse Image: Liberty wearing a coronet and facing left. 13 stars around.
Obverse Text: LIBERTY / 1890
Reverse Image: Heraldic eagle with wings outstretched clutching arrows and branch in talons, shield over chest. Scrolls on either side of eagle, ring of 13 stars above eagle's head, rays above stars.
Reverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / TWENTY DOLLARS / IN GOD WE TRUST / E PLURIBUS UNUM
Location
Currently not on view
date made
1890
designer
Longacre, James Barton
maker
United States Mint
ID Number
1985.0441.1046
catalog number
1985.0441.1046
accession number
1985.0441
One (1) 5 dollar coinUnited States, 1861Obverse Image: Quartz reduction mill.Obverse Text: JNO PARSON & CO.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 5 dollar coin
United States, 1861
Obverse Image: Quartz reduction mill.
Obverse Text: JNO PARSON & CO. / ORO
Reverse Image: Eagle with shield clutching arrows and olive branch.
Reverse Text: PIKES PEAK GOLD / FIVE D.
Description
The other pioneer mint in Colorado was the brainchild of an Indiana metallurgist, Dr. John D. Parsons. He appeared in Denver in the summer of 1858, and soon headed for Oro City with his assaying tools. He set up a business at Tarryall Mines, midway between Tarryall and Hamilton.
John Parsons's chosen trade was now that of coiner. He struck quarter and half eagles, whose obverses depicted a stamping mill, that essential piece of equipment for separating gold from its quartz matrix. A somewhat crude rendition of the American eagle held sway on the reverses of his coins. Parsons's products look primitive compared with Clark, Gruber's wares, and they may have been struck by hand.
However they were created, very few have survived. Six of John Parsons's quarter eagles are known, and only five of his halves.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1861
maker
John Parsons & Co.
ID Number
NU.68.159.1179
accession number
283645
catalog number
68.159.1179
One (1) 20 dollar coin, proofUnited States, 1853Obverse Image: Eagle with shield, arrows, and branch; ribbon in beak.Obverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / TWENTY D. / 900 THOUS.
Description (Brief)
One (1) 20 dollar coin, proof
United States, 1853
Obverse Image: Eagle with shield, arrows, and branch; ribbon in beak.
Obverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / TWENTY D. / 900 THOUS. / LIBERTY
Reverse Image: Engine-turning design.
Reverse Text: UNITED STATES ASSAY OFFICE OF GOLD / SAN FRANCISCO / CALIFORNIA. 1853.
Description
This was the final production of the provisional United States operation in San Francisco. A formal branch U.S. Mint was set up soon and began operations in the spring of 1854. A few proof strikes of the 1853 double eagle are known, including this coin.
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1853
mint
United States Assay Office of Gold
ID Number
1985.0551.0720
catalog number
1985.0551.0720
accession number
1985.0551
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1647
period of administration
1621 - 1665
head of government
Philip IV
ID Number
NU.84.56.03
catalog number
84.56.03
accession number
1984.0964
catalog number
1984.0964.0003
Currently not on view
Location
Currently not on view
Date made
1787
ID Number
1985.0441.0015
accession number
1985.0441
catalog number
1985.0441.0015

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