Anyone recognize this "token?"

Veep

Sorry, this isn't much to go on, but...

At the local show today, I was looking thorugh some Patriotics and saw a piece in the same stock book that doesn't appear in any of my references. Its not a Patriotic.

Anyway, its a bright brass piece with an extremely high relief bust of Lincoln on one side and a similar bust of Garfield on the other. There are no dates, slogans, or other identifying marks at all. Its the size of a cent, perhaps a bit smaller. The dealer didn't know its story but said it was rare and was asking $125. I think that its neat. I love Lincoln stuff, but for $125 I'd want to know the story first.

Ring a bell with anybody?

njcoincrank

Sounds like the Garfield/Lincoln medal struck by the US mint in the latter part of the 19th century.

I have one in my reference collection struck in silver. I'll look up more infor (date of issue etc) shortly.

njcoincrank

njcoincrank

What you saw is listed in MEDALS OF THE UNITED STATES, THE FIRST CENTURY 1792-1892 by R. W. Julian, page 106.

Lincoln and Garfield

Obverse: Bust of Abraham Lincoln to right in plain field.
B on truncation.

Reverse: Bust of James A Garfiedl to left in plain field.
B on truncation.

Size: 19 mm

Engraver: William Barber

a) AV b) AR c) AE

These medals were charged a $4 for the gold and 25c for the silver
Coiner's reccords show that in the fiscal year 1882 there were struck 425 gold and 2200 silver medals of this size.

Hope this answers your question.

njcoincrank

cladking

There is one of these that must be a modern reproduction. I've seen several!
There are a few more with different combinations but I've never been able to
determine their origin.