Also some facts about the Mint Director at the time...

Greetings Collectors,

There has been much "to do" about our current U.S.Mint Director, Mr. "Ed" Moy. He has not made many friends of late in his decision (and it "IS" his decision) to not strike any 2009 Proof American Gold and Silver Eagles. While I do own most of the Silver issues and a few of the proof $5 & $10 1/10th oz. in Gold and platinum, I am more upset that the "fractionals" in gold & Platinum have, for the most part ceased.

Ater finding an old bronze 3-inch Mint Medal in some forgotten areas of my safe, I have for the last couple of weeks done an enormous amount of research on present and past Mint Directors. The hours I have spent pouring over archives and old newspaper stories have made for some very "informative" reading. I have had quite a bit of spare time lately as my work has, for the most part, dried up. I am not going to bore you all with but a small portion of what I have learned and I do hope that there is something of interest in this post for all of you.

Our Mint Directors are usually very "low key" except when a major event occurs at one of the Mints or with our coinage. The following facts I found the most interesting. Several directors in the 1860's and 1870's apparently did favors for special friends and collectors by "re-striking" rare coins and even creating rare varieties. In 1964 after silver, for the most part, was removed from our coinage, Eva Adams had to defend the new "clad coinage". And in 1974 Mary Brooks had the challenge of finding the "missing" 15 (or so) aluminum cents that were passed out to various members of Congress for examination. She never succeeded.

The "Mint Medal" of a previous post of mine was one of a Mint Director that served from March 20 1922 to Sept 1923. At the time of "Frank Edgar Scobey's" appointment, it was by friend and "fellow hunter" President Harding. At the time of his appointment, he instantly became in charge of 1/3rd of the entire known supply of Gold in the world. At that time, that 33% was worth approx. 3 billion dollars. It was very interesting to see the breakdown of what we, the United States had, counting all three mints and the US Assay Office in New York. On that spring day in March 1922 we had the following: 2,839,000,000 in Gold bullion, 260,000,000 in Gold coin, 42,000,000 in Silver bullion, 262,000,000, in Silver coin, 280,000,000 in paper currency, and 3,000,000 in minor coins of nickels and pennies.

F. E. Scobey was born in Ohio and was the 1st of three Mint Directors from the great state of Ohio. He was at one time, the Clerk of the Ohio State Senate from 1902-1906. He also served as Sheriff of Troy Ohio. He then moved to San Antonio Texas where he was very active in "" politics", served as the Director of the US Federal Reserve Bank in San Antonio, and started a moving and stoarage business in 1913 affiliated with "Mayflower" Moving and Storage.

Several items of interest concerning his tenure as Mint Director include getting "Public Law 137" issued by the 67th Congress up and running which was the coining of the 1922 Gold "Grant" Dollar and the Grant Memorial Siver Dollar. These two issues commemorating the 100th anniversary of the birth of Ulysses S. Grant. Another important issue coined at that time was the "Monroe Doctrine" Silver half dollar.

One the most historical and important things that happened around his time as director, was the very small mintage of Lincoln cents at the Denver Mint. At the time in 1922, a little over 7 million cents were "hastily" struck in Jan. & Feb. at the Denver Mint and from the end of 1920 through most of 1924, no other cents were produced at that mint. A short but severe nationwide recession following the end of World War One, combined with the repeal of various temporary wartime taxes negated the demand for more cents. The Denver mint was shown to have on hand at the end of fiscal year 1922 (June 30th 1922) 20,250,700 Lincoln cents. And to this temporary stoppage in the minting of cents at the Denver Mint, Scobey was to have said, "There have been approx. 46 million dollars worth of pennies coined since the mint began in 1792, so whats the use in making more, when about the only things you can buy with a penny is a lollypop".

The 1922 cents from the Denver mint were recognized early on as a somewhat rarity and some ten years later a collector named Maurice D. Scharlack commented that, "The 1922-D cent is a comparitivly small issue and I feel confident it will increase in value". He went on to say that he had 25,000 of them packed away in a little wooden chest and said "I honestly believe this is the largest collection of this one cent". Boy, to come across that little chest of pennies today.

The "ultimate" tribute to the 1922 "no D cent" was an absurd hoax reported by "The Numismatist", in 1935. They reported Henry Ford had 150 of the reported 200 "no-D" cents and in order to accumulate all of them, he offered a new auto for each one surrendered to him. This rumor was so "widespread" that the then director of the mint in 1935 said, "Over 7 million cents were coined in 1922 at the Denver Mint, and he didn't believe Mr. Ford cared to give a new auto for one". Henry Ford did not comment but never gave a car for one of those pennies either.

All three of the US Mints briefly reopened to tourists following World War One. The Philidelphia Mint was again closed for some un-known reason, only to re-open by order from Scobey on April 1st 1922. A robbery at the Denver mint eight months later caused Scobey to again close all three mints to visitors indefinately. In 1923 partly as a result of this incident, the "entire" US Mints coin collection was donated to the Smithsonian Institution in Wasington DC.

After being born one year after the great Civil War in 1866 Frank Edgar Scobey lived a full and interesting life and was a part, in a pretty big way, of events surrounding this hobby we all love so much. The single biggest achievement to me was the moving of so many valuble "priceless" coins to the protection of the Smithsonian. I do not know the details of the robbery at the Denver mint in 1922 and can only imagine what may have been lost and if the items were ever recovered. I only know where all of our coins are today and am so glad I have had the pleasure of seeing them and I thank F.E. Scobey for that. Mr. Scobey died after suffering a stroke on Feb. 7th 1931 at his home in San Antonio and his body was returned to his birthplace in Troy Ohio for burial.

I am so glad I found an old "beat up" medal and took the time to learn about this man. We as collectors have so many people to be thankful for, and it would take "many years" of writing to touch on them all, even in a small way like I have here. If it were not for men and women like Frank Scobey, I am certain we would have lost much and gained much less. I hope you have enjoyed this little history lesson, touching on a time when our coinage was truely "works of art", produced and "watched over" by truely great Americans. I am feeling very lucky right about now and am still having fun with this "Hobby of Kings" we all hold so dear. I leave you with a "faded" bust of the United States 26th Mint Director 1922-1923 Frank Edgar Scobey... Happy Collecting,

WKF