Object Details
- mint
- United States Assay Office of Gold
- 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.
- Credit Line
- Estate of Josiah K. Lilly
- 1851
- ID Number
- NU.68.159.1142
- accession number
- 283645
- catalog number
- 68.159.1142
- Object Name
- coin
- ingot
- Physical Description
- gold (overall metal)
- 0 (overall die axis)
- 0 (overall die axis measurement)
- struck (overall production method)
- Measurements
- overall: .5 cm x 4.2 cm; 3/16 in x 1 21/32 in
- place made
- United States: California, San Francisco
- Related Publication
- Zoomable Image and Details
- Glossary of Coins and Currency Terms
- Related Web Publication
- http://americanhistory.si.edu/coins/glossary.cfm
- See more items in
- Work and Industry: National Numismatic Collection
- Coins
- Numismatics
- Coins, Currency and Medals
- Josiah K. Lilly Jr. Collection
- Legendary Coins
- Exhibition
- Value of Money
- Exhibition Location
- National Museum of American History
- National Museum of American History
- Record ID
- nmah_1101903
- GUID (Link to Original Record)
- https://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746ab-45a7-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa
