U.S. Assay Office, 50 Dollars, 1851
- 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.
- Object Name
- coin
- Date made
- 1851
- mint
- U.S. Assay Office
- Physical Description
- gold (overall metal)
- 0 (overall die axis)
- 0 (overall die axis measurement)
- struck (overall production method)
- Measurements
- overall: octagonal 41.9 x 41.9 mm; wt. 84.894 g
- place of issue
- United States: California, San Francisco
- ID Number
- NU*283645.1280
- accession number
- 283645
- catalog number
- 68.159.1142
- subject
- Coins, Currency and Medals
- Legendary Coins
- Coins
- Numismatics
- See more items in
- Political History: National Numismatic Collection
- Legendary Coins
- Coins
- Numismatics
- Exhibition
- Exhibit:
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
- Credit Line
- Lilly, Josiah K
- Publication title
- Glossary of Coins and Currency Terms
- Publication URL
- http://americanhistory.si.edu/coins/glossary.cfm
- Additional Media
-
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