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S. D. Childs & Co. Chicago Die Sinker. *** UPDATE*** Added a Grant Monument and the bottom thread

coinsarefuncoinsarefun Posts: 21,663 ✭✭✭✭✭
edited November 15, 2021 4:41AM in U.S. Coin Forum

Taken from David E Schenkman
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Acknowledgments
Thanks to former ANA Library Manager Amanda Harvey for her research assistance, as well as to Dave Bowers, Donald Erlenkotter, Rich Hall and Bob Leonard

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Schubal Davis Childs......The business was started in 1837 by Schubal Davis Childs and continued by his son S.D. Childs, Jr. ... The firm remained in business well into the twentieth century.
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The Presidential campaign of 1860 certainly brought them to the fore. Of the 76 varieties of Abraham Lincoln political medalets listed by J. Doyle Dewitt in his Century of Campaign Buttons, 1789- 1889, seven were struck by Childs. The company produced only one campaign medalet for Stephen Douglas and none for the other two candidates, John Bell and John Breckinridge. This might seem odd, except for the fact that the 1860 Republican National Convention, where Lincoln was nominated for President, was held in Chicago.
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When William Jennings Bryan ran for President in 1896 and 1900, numerous anti-Bryan satirical medals—referred to collectively as Bryan Money— were circulated. Typically, these large pieces were crudely made of lead or type metal (an alloy of tin, lead and antimony). One of them, listed by Fred Schornstein as number 323 in Bryan Money, is Childs’ creation. The interesting wording around the reverse rim of the 45mm-diameter, 5mm-thick medal is MADE BY S.D. CHILDS & CO. CHICAGO WHO MAKE ANYTHING IN METAL.
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In 1898 Childs was awarded a contract to produce the official medal for the 1898 Trans- Mississippi & International Exposition in Omaha, Nebraska. This beautiful 63.5mm medal was evidently struck in large numbers, as it is fairly easy to obtain today. Childs cut a copy of the obverse design and offered to strike 37mm medals for companies that won awards at the event, using that die for one side and one advertising the customer’s business for the other. S.D. Childs & Company struck a medal with this die to advertise its own services, proudly proclaiming on the other side, MAKERS OF THE OFFICIAL MEDAL OF AWARD.
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Nearly all known schedule tokens from the teens and early 1920s were struck by Childs. The schedule sides bear a very distinctive design that resembles the stitching on a baseball, and they are signed CHILDS CHICAGO in small letters. All of the known schedules Childs struck for other merchants were on 38mm, brass planchets. Oddly enough, one of the two tokens advertising Childs’ own business was aluminum.
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Childs Firm Sold at Auction
The S.D. Childs Company after 101 years in business was sold at auction recently. Alden Boyar was the only collector present and he obtained several items. The bulk of the medal collection, however, was to a party who placed an unlimited bid with the auctioneers. Mr. Boyar tells of buying an old desk (made around 1860) for a dollar and finding four silver dollars in it. Mr. Boyar obtained many name plates for old makes of bicycles and automobiles, as well as several hundred metallic items. The four coining presses were unsold. The Childs firm, during their long business life, struck thousands of medals, etc. They manufactured most of the Civil War Cents and Cards issued in the vicinity of Chicago.
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Just one of many medals and tokens that was struck by Childs
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Taken From Ralau's book

Comments

  • thisistheshowthisistheshow Posts: 9,386 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Those are really nice.
    Very interesting. I had never seen these before.
    Thanks for sharing!

  • rickoricko Posts: 98,724 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Thank you for the history and pictures.....very interesting. Cheers, RickO

  • BroadstruckBroadstruck Posts: 30,497 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited November 9, 2019 12:39PM

    Kids in school used to call him Schubal Dubal Doo :*

    To Err Is Human.... To Collect Err's Is Just Too Much Darn Tootin Fun!
  • kazkaz Posts: 9,052 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited November 9, 2019 1:11PM

    from the spelling in Rulau's book, I think Shubael is an anagram of "Beulah's" (after his mother).
    Nice post and history.

  • Namvet69Namvet69 Posts: 8,620 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Thanks for the info. I need to watch for a cwt or store card minted by them. Peace Roy

    BST: endeavor1967, synchr, kliao, Outhaul, Donttellthewife, U1Chicago, ajaan, mCarney1173, SurfinHi, MWallace, Sandman70gt, mustanggt, Pittstate03, Lazybones, Walkerguy21D, coinandcurrency242 , thebigeng, Collectorcoins, JimTyler, USMarine6, Elkevvo, Coll3ctor, Yorkshireman, CUKevin, ranshdow, CoinHunter4, bennybravo, Centsearcher, braddick, Windycity, ZoidMeister, mirabela, JJM, RichURich, Bullsitter, jmski52

  • DCWDCW Posts: 6,934 ✭✭✭✭✭

    This must be the same Childs Manufacturing Co that produced so many Storecards during the Civil War?

    Dead Cat Waltz Exonumia
    "Coin collecting for outcasts..."

  • BoosibriBoosibri Posts: 11,839 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I have a Schoolcraft MI Childs token, in MS64, an R9 variety but no ready pictures

  • ZoinsZoins Posts: 33,811 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited March 22, 2021 2:59AM

    @coinsarefun said:
    Childs Firm Sold at Auction
    The S.D. Childs Company after 101 years in business was sold at auction recently. Alden Boyar was the only collector present and he obtained several items. The bulk of the medal collection, however, was to a party who placed an unlimited bid with the auctioneers. Mr. Boyar tells of buying an old desk (made around 1860) for a dollar and finding four silver dollars in it. Mr. Boyar obtained many name plates for old makes of bicycles and automobiles, as well as several hundred metallic items. The four coining presses were unsold. The Childs firm, during their long business life, struck thousands of medals, etc. They manufactured most of the Civil War Cents and Cards issued in the vicinity of Chicago.

    I just revisited this thread so this is an old thread bump :)

    These are great tokens and I'm a big fan of die sinker store cards so I especially like the first token Stef posted.

    I'm very curious as to what became of the company's medal collection. Do we know what ever happened with the bulk of the medal collection which was sold to the unlimited bidder? Did any large medal collections from this company ever appear afterwards?

    Here's some additional info on S.D.Childs Company:

    https://famouskin.com/family-group.php?name=5736+shubael+d+childs&ahnum=1

  • ZoinsZoins Posts: 33,811 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited December 31, 2019 3:33PM

    @coinsarefun said:
    Great one @DCW would be super cool to see how many we can post here B)

    Great idea. Is there a listing of all of Civil War Tokens created by S.D. Childs, for example by Fuld number?

  • PennyGuyPennyGuy Posts: 143 ✭✭✭

    Many Michigan merchants purchased their tokens from Child’s Manufacturing. That company produced 21 of the 55 tokens in my Michigan Towns & Cities collection.

    "A penny hit by lightning is worth six cents". Opie Taylor

  • Pioneer1Pioneer1 Posts: 146 ✭✭✭

    The lead dealer in so-called dollars (Jeff Shevlin) has a website that has a "site map" tab (at the bottom) that allows site searches. While his website is still new, it does have several so-called dollars attributed to Childs. It looks like the discussion section is being revised and updated. This is the link directly to SCDs by Childs.

    http://www.so-calleddollar.com/mint/childs/

    A So-Called Dollar and Slug Collector... Previously "Pioneer" on this site...

  • ZoinsZoins Posts: 33,811 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited January 4, 2020 2:36PM

    @Pioneer1 said:
    The lead dealer in so-called dollars (Jeff Shevlin) has a website that has a "site map" tab (at the bottom) that allows site searches. While his website is still new, it does have several so-called dollars attributed to Childs. It looks like the discussion section is being revised and updated. This is the link directly to SCDs by Childs.

    http://www.so-calleddollar.com/mint/childs/

    That's great! I'm a huge fan of cataloging pieces by die sinker and manufacturer so I'm really happy to see this.

    Here's the top level Mints page:

    http://www.so-calleddollar.com/mints/

    They don't list William H Warner & Bro. yet, but hopefully they will and attribute HK-608 and HK-609 to them. Here's the information I found connecting these to this die sinker:

    https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1029294/springfield-so-called-dollars-pynchon-house-revisited-hk-608-hk-609/p1

  • fretboardfretboard Posts: 66 ✭✭✭

    Great article, much appreciated! :D Love that Indian store card Token at the top, super nice!

  • coinsarefuncoinsarefun Posts: 21,663 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited October 5, 2021 5:48PM

    THREAD UPDATE

    I added another S.D. Childs & Co. to the collection: This one is Rarity 8
    A fair amount of their tokens are rare but......they've made so many different types. I will never try
    to get a collection of them....lol

    .
    1891U. S. Grant Monument Chicago R-CHI-30 NGC MS 62 DPL

    Virtually impossible to take good images throughout the slab. So I have one showing it straight on
    and the other slightly tilted to show the Deep mirrors.
    Funny but the slab pictures are done with my new iPhone 11 plus. It works well but not for up close details as
    it starts to blur.

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  • ZoinsZoins Posts: 33,811 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Incredible piece Stef!

    Congrats on a great pick up :+1:

  • Pioneer1Pioneer1 Posts: 146 ✭✭✭

    On the obverse on the lower right pedestal are the initials "OA"

    http://www.medalartists.com/alstein-o.html

    I could not find additional info. I'd really like to know more about the engravers who worked for S.D. Childs... some of their work from the 1895 Atlanta Cotton Expo medals have initials like "HK", "AW", and "S" (look at HK-268 to HK-271).

    A So-Called Dollar and Slug Collector... Previously "Pioneer" on this site...

  • Pioneer1Pioneer1 Posts: 146 ✭✭✭

    As a follow up, I spent a day recently with some well known authors (SH) writing a new book about a certain type of historical medals (SCD), and we spent a great deal of time looking at medals from the World's Columbian Exposition. MANY of the medals from this exposition were stuck by S.D. Childs and Company. Aside from ones that are marked by Childs, there are a good number of unmarked medals that (i) stylistically scream Childs and (ii) have engraver initials on the medal that match a Childs engraver (like OA=Oscar Altstein). An interesting problem is trying to figure out who the engravers were who worked for Childs between 1885 and 1900 as I posted. For example, a number of SCDs (like HK-168 and HK-173) have SF initials on the medal. Who was SF ? Dick Johnson wasn't sure (http://www.medalartists.com/sf.html). Also, the 1895 SCD medal series from the Atlanta Cotton Expo has "S" as an initial on the Fred Douglas medal, also found on the 1889 Washington Centennial of Death w/ Aluminum below (has "S" initial on obverse truncation). Was S and SF the same person ?

    A few additions to the original person's post that started this thread:
    In 1865, Jerome A. Smith became partner in firm with SD Childs Jr & Company (new name); a second son George T Childs working in firm too

    In 1877, Albert Henry Childs joined the firm at age 16. Are his initials the AH ? He became the vice president in 1902 and president in 1908 of the company. Henry Kinnersley (stayed behind in NY) was associated with SD Childs. HK initials on the HK-270 to HK-271 series might belong to Henry Kinnersley ?

    The initials on my HK-269 are hard to make out ... either MH or AW or AH ....maybe AH = Albert Henry Childs (?)

    Totally aside, Charles Reinsch (could be CR if we find it) is a Childs engraver on HK-158. Assume the "C" on the reverse of HK-169 is copyright, but could it also be for Charles or Childs ?

    A few other medals for study:
    1892 Nebraska Silver Anniversary King-460; no definite initials seen
    1892 Mitchell SD Corn Belt Exposition -- tried to look but hard to confirm any initials
    1892 Baby Ruth / Trinity of Heros Dollar (HK-241) - OA initials
    1894 Midwinter Pieces (HK-251 to HK-253) -- OA initials on the obverse of HK-251 and 252; I suspect these are Childs pieces
    Pretty sure a good number of Midwinter pieces are Childs pieces; isn't there an OA on your Midwinter Pieces (HK-251/252 obverse pieces aka SH 7-8 and SH 7-9). For those in the SCD world, I think SH 7-8,9,10,11,12 are all SD Childs pieces.

    Please pull out your collections and 10x lenses and let me know.

    A So-Called Dollar and Slug Collector... Previously "Pioneer" on this site...

  • coinsarefuncoinsarefun Posts: 21,663 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Very good information @Pioneer1 thanks so much. I agree Childs did quite a bit of work out there and many without his signature.

  • I have a coin bank mfg by S. D. CHILDS & CO. I thought it was from 1930’s or 40’s. Possibly it is older.

  • TwoSides2aCoinTwoSides2aCoin Posts: 43,793 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Interesting. This just came in the shop today. Found behind a wall during a remodeling job in Omaha.
    63.5 mm. 131 grams


    s

  • tokenprotokenpro Posts: 846 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @Zoins said:

    @coinsarefun said:
    Great one @DCW would be super cool to see how many we can post here B)

    Great idea. Is there a listing of all of Civil War Tokens created by S.D. Childs, for example by Fuld number?

    Yes, there are several different options.

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