Roger Burdette's Saint Gaudens Double Eagles Book 4 4

[GoldFinger1969]

No other countries were making gold coins -- certainly not big double eagle-like coins -- in the volume we did.  Our mintages were usually in the millions.

[RAJ on COINS]

On 11/2/2020 at 9:16 AM, GoldFinger1969 said:

Wow, that's great Ross !  Happy readings !

Have you been an active buyer of Saints and/or other coins/stuff @ Heritage ?  I've been an active bidder but haven't won any Saints via HA (won currency + other coins). 

The HA catalogs themselves are great resources, filled with information and great pictures.  Got a few of them down at FUN though HA hasn't sent me any (yet) as I guess I am not considered a "heavy hitter" in their online rankings. 

I had been up to this year (the latest run up in gold prices).  Was building my collection of common date Saint Varieties.  Oddly, Heritage was sending me World and Ancient Auction catalogs too, though I haven't bid on any of those.  I recently had to dispose of some old catalogs because they were just piling up.  The information is available digitally in Heritage's "Auction Archives".  They are beautifully printed books with massive amounts of information.  I tend to keep the ones where an important collection or the focus of the auction relate to my personal interests.     

[RWB]

A wide range of auction catalogs, including all of Heritage's, are available free to view or download on the Newman Numismatic Portal (NNP).

A caveat concerning auction and general coin dealer catalogs might be appropriate. Most descriptions are built on old information or "traditional wisdom" rather than modern research and analysis. There are exceptions and they are most prevalent among high value lots from Heritage and Stacks-Bowers. Also, any catalog with John Kraljevich's name attached is likely to be far more dependable than others. Among the better lot descriptions are those with carefully complied provenance including price histories and that clearly mention discrepancies and unknowns.

[RWB]

On 11/17/2020 at 7:32 PM, GoldFinger1969 said:

You didn't have to melt it or send it back to the U.S. though, did you Roger ? 

DE's were $20 face value....if you SPENT it, yeah, $20 U.S.....but if you sold it to another bank or a licensed dealer or another government (not sure of overseas restrictions compared to 1933 FDR EO's) you could get the full $35 that 1 ounce of gold was worth.

Not quite....For all of 1933 and January 1934 the Treasury paid legal tender value for US gold coins - what they were worth as money. After the Gold Act passed, licensed gold dealers could sell the coins as bullion (the Act removed legal tender status from gold coins). People who had DE and sold to gold buyers usually got about $28. Outside of the US, coins were just metal - as they had always been - and traded as bullion.

[RWB]

On 11/16/2020 at 2:46 PM, GoldFinger1969 said:

Roger, so you are saying that a large portion of those Saints (and earlier Liberty's) were melted OVERSEAS.... in addition to lots of DE's overseas staying in Mint bags (the hoards we found over the decades) ?

If it's the majority of that 43 MM in Saints, it's not a small number, it's damn big !!

Also, I guess everytime a hoard is found that 43 MM number goes down and the 3.7 MM number goes up a bit.

This letter will help visualize the fate of many US gold coins - they were routinely culled from circulation and recoined. This maintained the intrinsic value of the coins in circulation. This is just one of dozens of similar Transfer Orders issued every year for decades.

[RWB]

The two factors continuously acting to turn US double eagles and other gold coins back into metal bars were:

1. Export and melting (by far the largest factor); and
2. Domestic recoinage of light weight/ worn/mutilated coins.

Other denominations had slightly different attrition factors. A good example is the $1 gold coin. After a couple of years of initial success, these little coins became a nuisance in circulation and especially at Post Offices. The coins accumulated as Mints continued production and consumers rejected them as inconvenient. After 1862, gold dollars were largely used in domestic and English jewelry. The Treasury eventually accepted that the coins were not circulating and approved melting them by the millions - usually into double eagles which were then exported. Gold dollar attrition was due to:

1. Government melting of unwanted coins;
2. Domestic recoinage of light weight/ worn/mutilated coins;
3. Domestic jewelry use; and
4. Export for jewelry use.

Production of gold dollars was maintained until 1889. Treasury was reluctant to produce the coins, and was aware of their primary use in jewelry. However, they were popular for christening gifts, wedding anniversaries, and at holiday time. Treasury Secretaries inevitably gave-in to public and official peer pressure during the latter part of each year, resulting in limited production. [See also Renaissance of American Coinage 1905-1915, "Treasurer's Treasure."]

[RAJ on COINS]

FYI...

In Stacks Bowers upcoming auction there is an MS63 1925 UNATTRIBUTED DDR (Double Die Reverse), Lot 3993

(Session 3 - Internet Only - U.S. Coins. Lots 3001-4156. The live auction session begins on Monday, December 21 at 9:00 AM PT.)

https://auctions.stacksbowers.com/lots/view/3-PDY9Q/1925-saint-gaudens-double-eagle-ms-63-pcgs

This is a cherrypicker's variety and quite a bit rarer than your run of the mill 1925 Saint DE.

Here is a chance to pick up a fairly rare coin (less than 100 certified attributed examples) for the price of a common one.

(More than 108,000 "normal" 1925's have been certified by the top 2 Third party graders...)

Merry Christmas!

 

[RWB]

Thank you, Santa!   Please give the elk an extra carrot !

[Henri Charriere]

[Note:  This may be beyond the means of most collectors but Regency Auctions Rare Coins Auctions #42, slated for early December, offers a little something for everyone if only to present some outstanding U.S. coins with interesting informative histories which would be of passing interest to RWB, Goldfinger1969, Coinbuf, Just Bob, Walkerfan and just about everyone in between. (I regret I do not know how to provide a quick link to their fine catalog.)]

[RWB]

1 hour ago, Quintus Arrius said:

[Note:  This may be beyond the means of most collectors but Regency Auctions Rare Coins Auctions #42, slated for early December, offers a little something for everyone if only to present some outstanding U.S. coins with interesting informative histories which would be of passing interest to RWB, Goldfinger1969, Coinbuf, Just Bob, Walkerfan and just about everyone in between. (I regret I do not know how to provide a quick link to their fine catalog.)]

Thanks! I will take a look.

Reviewed the on-line catalog. Many very nice coins. Very cumbersome to use. Every description has to be expanded, but there's no collapse button. Did not see anything permitting download of a full PDF for off-line review.

Edited November 26, 2020 by RWB

[GoldFinger1969]

On 11/24/2020 at 7:56 AM, Ross J said:

I tend to keep the ones where an important collection or the focus of the auction relate to my personal interests.     

Ditto, when I went to FUN earlier this year HA was promoting the sale of a 1927-D Saint so that booklet had oodles of information I hadn't seen before on that specific year and coin.

[GoldFinger1969]

On 11/24/2020 at 12:53 PM, RWB said:

A wide range of auction catalogs, including all of Heritage's, are available free to view or download on the Newman Numismatic Portal (NNP). A caveat concerning auction and general coin dealer catalogs might be appropriate. Most descriptions are built on old information or "traditional wisdom" rather than modern research and analysis. There are exceptions and they are most prevalent among high value lots from Heritage and Stacks-Bowers. 

Thanks for the portal information, Roger.

The HA FUN catalog had commentary and a letter from a dealer circa 1948 (?) that I hadn't seen anywhere before.  I can usually tell when someone or something is just regurgitating the same information.  I see the same commentary from your book on many HA Saint auctions where they just recycle the basics for particular years.

At least your information is new and pretty complete and often in-depth.  Lots of other coins just shared the same generic paragraph or two.

Edited December 3, 2020 by GoldFinger1969

[GoldFinger1969]

 

On 11/25/2020 at 10:30 AM, RWB said:

 A good example is the $1 gold coin. After a couple of years of initial success, these little coins became a nuisance in circulation and especially at Post Offices. The coins accumulated as Mints continued production and consumers rejected them as inconvenient.

This is really interesting because it is counter-intuitive to what I had gleamed from cursory readings concerning those times.

My understanding was the disdain for the "Greenbacks" of the Civil War Era led to suspicion for paper money and you either wanted silver (agrarian and rural folks, the "Free Silver" crowd of WJB) or gold (more urban businessmen and shop owners).  

I thought it took decades for gold and silver certificates to gain acceptance.

Edited December 3, 2020 by GoldFinger1969

[Conder101]

Much more of the paper money suspicion was pre civil war when there was no federal government paper money.  The paper didn't trade at par during the war because there was always the question of who would win.  The value of the paper started inceasing toward the end of the war as it became clear the Union would prevail, but it still didn't reach full par value until the ealty 1870's.

One of the reasons why the gold dollar was probably not popular was its very small size.  It made it difficult to handle and very easy to lose.  A dollar was a larger enough amount of money that you really didn't want to risk losing it.  Silver coins were still "real money" and much easier to handle, even if they were bulkier.

[GoldFinger1969]

5 minutes ago, Conder101 said:

One of the reasons why the gold dollar was probably not popular was its very small size.  It made it difficult to handle and very easy to lose.  A dollar was a larger enough amount of money that you really didn't want to risk losing it.  Silver coins were still "real money" and much easier to handle, even if they were bulkier.

Any comments on the popularity of $2.50, $3, $5, and $10 gold coins ?  I know $20 DEs were tough to justify handling on a daily basis.

[Insider]

@RWB

Any info on US $20 dies being sent to Russia to strike Saints?

[RWB]

1 hour ago, Insider said:

@RWB

Any info on US $20 dies being sent to Russia to strike Saints?

I'm aware of the rumor, but I've seen nothing. Given the vehement anti-Bolshevik policies in the US, and explicit rejection of Soviet gold in any form, sending DE dies to the "bad guys" would make no sense. It was difficult to get basic humanitarian aid to them during the NEP or afterward during the famine.

[RWB]

1 hour ago, GoldFinger1969 said:

Any comments on the popularity of $2.50, $3, $5, and $10 gold coins ?  I know $20 DEs were tough to justify handling on a daily basis.

$3 and $1 were jewelry pieces and not circulating coins after the Civil War. There are frequent archival letters from jewelers asking for these to use in bangles and pins. The others were around but letters suggest people found local and city banks did not have gold coins to pay out....especially bright, new coins. Depositing a good US gold coin in order to receive new coins in return was prohibited, but the Mints and Treasury routinely exchanged a few gold pieces for collectors or people wanting a new half eagle for a present. The volume of gold recoinage implies these denominations circulated, although mainly in the West and South coast ports. (The 1875 letter  - above - from the Asst Treasurer, New Orleans, is illustrative.)

(Note that banks were required to hold reserves in various kind of debt instruments and gold coin. However, these reserves could not be paid out. It didn't matter that XYZ National Bank held $50,000 in gold coin as reserves, the coins could not be paid to a customer.)

[RWB]

An important consideration for catalog descriptions is cost, and original research is expensive. So companies fall back to published material where someone else has already invested the research cost.

[GoldFinger1969]

53 minutes ago, RWB said:

An important consideration for catalog descriptions is cost, and original research is expensive. So companies fall back to published material where someone else has already invested the research cost.

Much of the descriptive information I see is so basic as to be useless....the exceptions are the borrowed material from Akers' book and yours.  The detailed Saints info on high-end coins at HA comes from your book and is outstanding.

[Insider]

4 hours ago, RWB said:

I'm aware of the rumor, but I've seen nothing. Given the vehement anti-Bolshevik policies in the US, and explicit rejection of Soviet gold in any form, sending DE dies to the "bad guys" would make no sense. It was difficult to get basic humanitarian aid to them during the NEP or afterward during the famine.

At one time they were our allies.  That's when I heard it was done.  Hard to believe any old dies would be around.    

[RWB]

2 hours ago, Insider said:

At one time they were our allies.  That's when I heard it was done.  Hard to believe any old dies would be around.    

Soviet Union was an ally only following the German Invasion (Unternehmen Barbarossa) on June 22, 1941. They were never trusted by Roosevelt or Churchill. Absolutely no reason to "loan" them DE dies - and to what end? Sweden was pleased to get all the gold the USSR could produce with slave labor.

Edited December 4, 2020 by RWB

[GoldFinger1969]

10 hours ago, Insider said:

@RWB

Any info on US $20 dies being sent to Russia to strike Saints?

Why would closely-guarded and protected $20 dies -- any dies -- be sent to Russia to strike ANYTHING

I would think they would be destroyed if not stored in locked vaults for historical reasons.

 

[Henri Charriere]

10 minutes ago, GoldFinger1969 said:

Why would closely-guarded and protected $20 dies -- any dies -- be sent to Russia to strike ANYTHING

I would think they would be destroyed if not stored in locked vaults for historical reasons.

 

[True indeed.  It took the fall of the Berlin wall and the dissolution of the great U.S.S.R. to get them to acknowledge Hitler was dead and to surrender his bones for x-ray analysis.]

[Conder101]

4 hours ago, RWB said:

Soviet Union was an ally only following the German Invasion (Unternehmen Barbarossa) on June 22, 1941.

And by then all the old dies would have been destroyed.  After the WWI we had men over there fighting against the Bolsheviks, so I don't think we would be sending them dies then.  And why would Russia (not the Soviet Union) need to strike double eagles?  Why not their own gold coins?

[GoldFinger1969]

14 minutes ago, Conder101 said:

And by then all the old dies would have been destroyed.  After the WWI we had men over there fighting against the Bolsheviks, so I don't think we would be sending them dies then.  And why would Russia (not the Soviet Union) need to strike double eagles?  Why not their own gold coins?

Yeah, I think Roger must have mis-typed.....sending them $20 DE dies would be like sending them plates for $20 or $50 or $100 bills.  Ridiculous.

Wouldn't send those to ANYBODY even our friends in the UK, let alone the USSR.

Maybe he meant blank dies.

Edited December 4, 2020 by GoldFinger1969

[RWB]

9 hours ago, GoldFinger1969 said:

Yeah, I think Roger must have mis-typed.....sending them $20 DE dies would be like sending them plates for $20 or $50 or $100 bills.  Ridiculous.

Wouldn't send those to ANYBODY even our friends in the UK, let alone the USSR.

Maybe he meant blank dies.

I'm confused. Did I write someplace saying that we sent DE dies to the Soviet Union? Hmmmm.....Let's see --- give me 5 words then ask me to repeat them 20 minutes later....

[GoldFinger1969]

19 minutes ago, RWB said:

I'm confused. Did I write someplace saying that we sent DE dies to the Soviet Union? Hmmmm.....Let's see --- give me 5 words then ask me to repeat them 20 minutes later....

No you didn't....Insider asked the question and you responded but I don't know why he even asked it and you weren't even more dismissive.  I think that is what was confusing -- you seemed to think the question was plausible but no evidence had been found.

The United States Mint/Treasury should not be sending dies to ANYBODY, IMO.  If they ever did, wow.  Like sending currency plates which would allow a foreign power to counterfeit.

[RWB]

27 minutes ago, GoldFinger1969 said:

No you didn't....Insider asked the question and you responded but I don't know why he even asked it and you weren't even more dismissive.  I think that is what was confusing -- you seemed to think the question was plausible but no evidence had been found.

The United States Mint/Treasury should not be sending dies to ANYBODY, IMO.  If they ever did, wow.  Like sending currency plates which would allow a foreign power to counterfeit.

OK. Now I understand. It's an unusual question, but no reason to be completely dismissive. During WW-II we sent a small set of currency printing plates for use in disrupting the German war economy, but that was quickly discovered to be a 'mistake' and corrected -- but I'm going on memory at the moment.  We received coinage dies from India for some Saudi minor coins and Maria Theresa thalers, and made some dies for London.... All of that is another story.

Now what were those 5 words.....?

[GoldFinger1969]

21 minutes ago, RWB said:

During WW-II we sent a small set of currency printing plates for use in disrupting the German war economy, but that was quickly discovered to be a 'mistake' and corrected -- but I'm going on memory at the moment.  We received coinage dies from India for some Saudi minor coins and Maria Theresa thalers, and made some dies for London.... All of that is another story.

OK that's plausible....but we would never send working dies or currency plates for U.S. coins or currency overseas...I think that is what Insider was implying.

Blanks, I understand....but not from-the-Mint official U.S. dies/plates.