Engraver John S. Gardner
RogerB
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During 1795 John S. Gardner was paid $192.00 to engrave dies for the Philadelphia Mint. Which dies did he engrave?
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Draped Bust Half Dime? Edit to say wild guess.
Kind of doubt he engraved "wild guesses" but maybe he was a forerunner of Audubon? ....
Wait... is this trivia? You are the one that always tells us things like this!
Google tells me he engraved device punches that Scot then used on all 6 denominations. But other results say he may have engraved complete master dies.
"You Suck Award" - February, 2015
Discoverer of 1919 Mercury Dime DDO - FS-101
Good question. Breen attributes some of the Lib Cap coppers to Gardener, but then every time a new assistant came on board, he did the same thing, of course with no evidence whatsoever.
Stewart and Taxay (with Nyberg quoting after them) note a Aug 1795 letter from Gardener requesting a pay raise based on his having "engraved" the reverses for all of the denominations. As Nyberg points out, that work was certainly finishing the working dies rather than engraving the master as in 1796, obviously disillusioned with engraving, he wrote to Boudinot seeking the position of Melter and Refiner, suggesting the Mint send him to England for training as he had no experience. The Mint, of course, refused and Gardener left.
Here's hoping that you've found original copy of the 1795 letter.
I guess this answer is no longer acceptable.
The trouble is, this piece does not seem to have Robert Scot's "fingerprint" on it. So if it is not Robert Scott, who did make at least the obverse die? The die was probably made in the late summer to early fall of 1795 because it was used to produce the Lettered Edge and Plain Edge cents, S-76 a and b. Going by the die state evidence, I think that this piece was stuck in late December 1795.
The half cents also show evidence of a different hand.
1794
1795 Lettered Edge.
Does anyone know a Gardner made any other dies, perhaps outside of the mint? If so that would help to answer some questions.
Not sure of the numbers involved. He was paid more than $700 in 1795 and
the quoted $192 appears to be for his work in the last part of 1794 and the
first quarter of 1795. It is doubtful, despite Breen and others, that Gardner
prepared any original hubs for the coinage. It is likely that he simply filled in
for Robert Scot when the latter was preparing the hubs and did not have the
needed time to prepare the working dies. Gardner would also have aided Scot
in the preparation of working dies when there was an urgent need. The 1795
payments to Gardner were published in the June 2017 issue of The Numismatist.
Not to many researchers. That’s the old Breen reasoning - “it looks different so it must be someone else.” But the only thing “looks different” proves is that it looks different; it is not substantive evidence that someone else did it.
What it does show is that there was enough touch-up during and after sinking the die that it has a different look. The die steel at this time was not particularly good and a good bit could go awry in the sinking. Hard spots and soft spots requiring hand correction would have been common.
Additionally, we have no idea if Scot became overloaded and perhaps had Gardener finish some obverses. The only thing we do have documented evidence of is that Gardener said he did all of the reverses. But, once again, finishing a die is not engraving a die or the master.
Gardener’s work was obviously good enough to get him a raise, however, there is no evidence he was a particularly accomplished die sinker or engraver. There is no record of him being an engraver prior to employment at the Mint, no evidence he did dies either before or after, and if he was so good, why did he seek to leave the engraving dept. (other than the M&R position paid more)? IIRC, there’s no record of him after he leaves the Mint.
The old story that he was seeking another position because Scot disliked him is again just that -an old story with no supporting evidence. If Scot really disliked him, then how did he get a raise? The director would not have given a raise over the objections of the Chief Engraver and certainly would have checked to see if he had done what he claimed.
I, for one, am glad that passing off unsupported speculation as fact is no longer acceptable. All it ever did was create a lot of confusion and seemingly endless correction when someone finally found hard evidence.
The John Smith Gardner final paragraph above is from the letter requesting that he be sent to England, at the Mint's expense, for training to be a melter and refiner - Boudinot did not approve Gardner's request. The two page letter does not mention engraving (National Archives at Phil., RG 104, General Correspondence). The other Gardner letter referenced by Breen and Taxay I could not find, and I also had NARA archivist Matthew Dibiase search for the letter - not found, so the above letter is currently the only one by Gardner known (this may also be in NNP).
When I was researching archival records for Robert Scot's engravings, I also looked for possible Gardner engravings using the same sources (newspapers, business directories, government and private archives, contemporary books). I found much more than I expected for Robert Scot, over 800 engravings. For Gardner, I found zero evidence of any engravings he did before or after the Mint.
Engraving an original die (master) by hand takes considerable experience and skill. To attribute Mint original dies to a person with no recorded engraving outside the Mint does not make any sense. There is no evidence that Gardner had the capability to engrave original dies. The finishing of working dies - punching letters and numbers, engraving dentils, lapping and polishing - could be done by someone with less experience, which I believe is what Gardner did for the MInt.
Some sub-types of coins were attributed to Gardner because they have slight differences. Well, I found that Scot had slight variation with his engraving all through his career - paper money borders and script, book illustrations, stamp dies, seals. He liked to slightly change designs for variety. I believe the same applies to coinage dies 1794-1807, slight variations by Scot in the original dies and hubs.
There has been a very strong negative bias against Robert Scot, caused mainly by Breen and Taxay, which spread to other authors. Breen and Taxay did little research on Scot's engraving work prior to the Mint, and they had the false assumption that Scot was not a very good engraver. Therefore they tried to attribute much of Scot's work to other engravers - Frederick Reiche, John Smith Gardner, and even John Eckstein who never engraved for the Mint. Researcher R.W. Julian was an exception who did not follow Breen and Taxay's opinion of Scot, as Julian called Scot's engraving skill "very good."
If anyone wants to attribute coinage designs to John Smith Gardner, they need to provide evidence that he had the ability to engrave original dies.
I agree that Scot was a good engraver in the 1790s and early 1800s. His Matron Head Large Cent and Capped Bust $2.50 gold were really quite ugly.
I believe, for a number of reasons with evidence, that John Reich engraved the ~1817 Matron Head large cent.
The 1821 $2.50 Capped Head gold was just mediocre by the 75 year old Robert Scot. However, modern numismatists can be nitpicky, magnifying digital images to 40X size and showing every defect. There were no contemporary complaints for the $2.50, about the size of a dime, and it apparently looked good to the general public in commerce.
If Reich engraved the 1817 Cent, who engraved the 1816 Cent, which is the same type?
The $2.50 coins from the 1820s had so little impact on the economy, it’s not surprising that no one commented about them. It’s an ugly coin. In fact all of the U.S. gold coins from 1813 until August 1834 are ugly. The Classic Head gold coins were passable looking.
I used ~1817 because the 1816-dated Matron cents were proven to be struck in 1817. When the dies were engraved, nobody knows for sure.
Kneass slightly improved Scot's 1821 $2.50. Whether it is ugly or not is personal opinion. My wife has called me handsome, others have called me ugly or worse.
Bill, Who proved that? I seriously question because over 2.8 million were struck in 1816. The average die life at this time was around 325,000, so that would require around 8 to 9 die pair. Given the mintages in 1810’s, I seriously doubt the mint had 8 to 9 leftover obverse and reverses in 1816.
Were the first deliveries in Feb 1816 from 1814 dies? Possibly, and more likely probably, given the number struck in 1814.
Craig, I stand corrected, the 1816 cents were struck in 1816.
Whew, thanks. You really thru me for a loop there.
One must also remember that "engraver" was not the same as "die sinker" in the 18th and early 19th centuries.