"Secrets of the U.S. Mint" on Discovery Channel Tonight

chiefbob

"Cameras unlock the secret process by which metals are transformed into money". On Discovery Channel tonight at 9 P.M. Eastern time.

I think I've seen this one before, and it was pretty good. Especially if it shows the West Point Mint and the gold coin production.

Bob

Rotts

Thanks for the info...... Rotts

Gemini

Now I guess the secret process will be revealed and it won't be a secret anymore.

nwcs

I've seen this episode before and it is a great one!

MrKelso

I got the dish all tuned up today and ready to go The dish guy had a heck of a time removing the old birds nest from the LNB's. It's on agin tomorrow i think.

fcloud

Thanks for the info!

Is that other coin show on tonight?

airplanenut

Don't forget that "Private Jets" is on the hour before... they love me!

MrKelso

OK so HOW THE HECK DID THE GOLD ERRORS GET OUT IN 1999 if they take all those precautions? Holy Crappolla....

danglen

This is a really neat show they rerun from time to time. At the end of the program, you can buy the video, which I have done. I run it for new people interested in collectiong coins as a hobby, and I find it really piques their interest.

CLASSICS

yea, a very good show. lots of infomation.

MrKelso

I loved the shots of all the gold bars at west point. I didn't know that platinum coins were struck 5 times. I learned a few things in the first half hour. Cool.

CLASSICS

they were also showing the ngc grading room, and how they slab coins. also how to tell conterfit copper,gold, coins and silver coins.

MrKelso

Excellent Show. Loved it.
and it ended with my favorite Coin of all, GOLD.

fcloud

It still bugs me to see those grubby hands all over the coins in the grading room. $20,000+ St. Gaudens, and they handle it with their bare hands. Doh!

airplanenut

<< <i>they were also showing the ngc grading room, and how they slab coins. also how to tell conterfit copper,gold, coins and silver coins. >>

I liked the NGC grading room part...

I also liked the shots of old coins, even if they weren't monetarily valuable.

Jeremy

FatMan

Nice job Discovery Channel. Interesting for various levels of coin expertise. Even my wife who doesn't know Washington is on the quarter found it interesting.

fcloud, I agree with you. I would feel much better if the graders would were gloves or something. When that grader was fingering that coin, if he didn't leave prints he came awfully close.

nwcs

Yeah, seeing all that gold is awesome! It was interesting hearing from the NGC people. I wonder if they chose NGC because most of their contacts were ANA people? In any case, we need to ask Mark if they really sit at a table like that. But I didn't like how they handled the coins, either. Still, it was a great show. There's another one where they show the canadian mint's process for refining gold for their coins. Awesome!

Neil

FatMan

Neil

IMO-Geography probably was the reason for NGC. NGC at the time was not far from West Point. This was produced before they moved to FLA.

nwcs

True, they did refer to them as being in NJ. Still, I have to say that it wasn't the most flattering expose of the grading room! But it was very interesting that Mark Salzberg talked about crackouts and disagreements with their grading...

FatMan

And Mark openly said he has recieved personal "Threats".

This is tough busniess. Maybe they moved to Florida to get away from Tony Soprano & Co.

TomB

I believe in the auction scene that we saw Laura Sperber (our very own Legend) in the audience at least twice.

nwcs

Where was she? I wonder how many other people were in there? I thought I saw Bob Campbell, too.

merz2

I liked the parts with Fred Weinberg.Wasn't that Jay parrino that purchased the 1913 Liberty Nickel?

Tootawl

So that's where fingerprints come from!!

Tootawl

Handling a 1907 St Gaudens bare handed - wow.

nucklehead

I bought this show a months ago,.Would love to own the others.

DanC

Now THAT was cool. First time I'd seen it.

I thought it was ironic that there was such incredibly tight security at West Point, yet they shipped the ingots off to a private company for making into blanks. I didn't see any real tight security there - but perhaps it was off-camera or something.

I never quite understood the exact process that the dies undergo to create the frosty raised devices. "Cellophane Tape"...
That's amusing.

I thought Discovery did a darned good job. I'd like to have seen about 2 more hours of it though...

tompkins

Was an interesting hour---I thought it was very informative and well done (in spite of the interminably long commercial breaks). I was totally unaware of how manual the process is for gold coins---that is, manually mixing in the copper; manually and repeatedly feeding the ribbons through the press until they are exactly the correct thickness; manually putting the blanks into the press; etc. It would be interesting to see the same processes for the mainstream production coins, which,given the volumes, clearly must be totally automated.

Very interesting show!

Pete