United States 1933 Double Eagle $20 Gold Coin
The
1933 double eagle $20 gold coin is one of American Numismatics’ most notorious coins. Only one surviving specimen was ever monetized and made legal to own, yet an uncertain number of examples still exist.
When the
United States made the controversial decision in 1933 to suspend the gold standard that it had based its monetary policy on since the turn of the 20th century, most double eagles dated that year were summarily melted down. It was an ignoble end for the most spectacular of all American coin designs.
That American sculptor
Augustus Saint-Gaudens would have a hand in creating that design and remaking American coinage was no easy accomplishment. The world-renowned sculptor, venerated in his time and even more so sense, had a serious distaste for the Mint’s bureaucracy and an even lesser opinion of its chief engraver. He turned down more commissions than he could possibly accept. Commissions with even better terms. A
United States 1864-S Seated Liberty Quarter
San Francisco and along the West Coast were handling a rarity in the mid-1860s.
As their counterparts in the east were vanishing from circulation during the Civil War, silver coins in San Francisco were circulating much more extensively – including the
1864-S Seated Liberty quarter, which turned out to be a major rarity. Consumers might have known that the freshly-struck quarters were prized in the east for their silver content but might not have suspected that, decades later, the coins would be sought-after by collectors interested in their scarcity, not their precious metal.
The new branch mint began striking silver quarters and half dollars in 1855