Stack's 1798 B30 Dollar Copper "Die Trial" - for serious collectors
Rittenhouse
Posts: 580 ✭✭✭✭
The 1798 B30 Dollar Copper "Die Trial" in Stack's August 15 auction is the most exciting item I've seen in 25 years. If you are a serious early type, early dollar or die trial specialist I strongly suggest you consider bidding on this piece. This piece is extremely important from a minting technology perspective. If anyone here wins the piece or knows who wins the piece, please contact me. I will be doing a full technical article on the piece.
And no, I do not have a monetary interest in the piece nor I am "stumping" for Stack's. My only interest in the piece is a purely technical one. In fact, I disagree with the catalog description. While certainly an interesting tale, the catolog description conflicts with Mint records on some key points.
IMO, the piece is not a die trial per se, but rather a "set-up piece". As many of you may be aware, RW Julian and I have worked together on early minting technology for the past 20 years or so. We have often discussed the internal operations of the Mint and how they set up and operated the presses. While the Mint records are far more detailed than most realize, they do not specifically address the issue of testing the press set-up before striking. This has left RWJ and I to speculate on how they might have done it, relying on my experience as a former process engineer in the metals forming industry and that of friends likewise in the metals forming or private minting industries. The piece in question is the only one we've seen that meets the critieria we've discussed for a "set-up piece" and can't be categorized as otherwise.
While its status as the only known set-up piece makes this discovery highly important, it is also significant from another aspect since it reveals quite a bit about the so-called "open collar" purportedly in use at this time. While I obviously don't want to reveal too much before I publish, the question is: How do you strike a piece like this if there's a collar in place? Answer is: You can't.
Here's a link to the Stack's auction. This is a very significant piece. Kudos and thanks to the discoverers.
And no, I do not have a monetary interest in the piece nor I am "stumping" for Stack's. My only interest in the piece is a purely technical one. In fact, I disagree with the catalog description. While certainly an interesting tale, the catolog description conflicts with Mint records on some key points.
IMO, the piece is not a die trial per se, but rather a "set-up piece". As many of you may be aware, RW Julian and I have worked together on early minting technology for the past 20 years or so. We have often discussed the internal operations of the Mint and how they set up and operated the presses. While the Mint records are far more detailed than most realize, they do not specifically address the issue of testing the press set-up before striking. This has left RWJ and I to speculate on how they might have done it, relying on my experience as a former process engineer in the metals forming industry and that of friends likewise in the metals forming or private minting industries. The piece in question is the only one we've seen that meets the critieria we've discussed for a "set-up piece" and can't be categorized as otherwise.
While its status as the only known set-up piece makes this discovery highly important, it is also significant from another aspect since it reveals quite a bit about the so-called "open collar" purportedly in use at this time. While I obviously don't want to reveal too much before I publish, the question is: How do you strike a piece like this if there's a collar in place? Answer is: You can't.
Here's a link to the Stack's auction. This is a very significant piece. Kudos and thanks to the discoverers.
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Comments
--Christian
If I am able, I will put the winner in touch with you or at least ask they they reach out to you so that you can study the piece in hand.
Betts medals, colonial coins, US Mint medals, foreign coins found in early America, and other numismatic Americana
-David
I spoke with the excavator yesterday, this is a great story which will all come out in due course.....
I was once told of a 1792 pattern quarter struck on leather, formerly in the Chase Money Museum. I suspect this is another such "set up piece".
The observation about the collar is interesting, but I don't know enough to say if the fact that the set-up piece was not struck in collar tells us anything about how the actual coins were made.
BTW, I wonder if the piece should be included in Judd if it is not a true regular dies trial piece...
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.
If you look at it far away, it looks like the head and neck of a cow...............i'm just saying.
Too many positive BST transactions with too many members to list.
<< <i>If you look at it far away, it looks like the head and neck of a cow...............i'm just saying. >>
Others have mentioned that it looks like the head of a horse and I agree. It's interesting but not as "exciting" as others have declared. Looks like a bored mint worker took a copper horse head trinket during his lunch break and struck it with standard mint dies. Later he threw it away. How many other die trials exist that are struck on such an odd shaped piece of copper?
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire