Go to a coin show and price the following 1921 U.S. coins: the S-mint nickel, the P- and D-mint dimes, the quarter, all three halves, and the Peace dollar. What do they all have in common? Low mintages and high prices. Why is that? Because the state of the economy plays a very important role in the production of our currency.

The post-World War I years saw a slowdown in the economy of the United States. The decade before World War I, however, had seen booming economic growth unmatched in history. This amazing economic growth continued during the war, when many nations mobilized their national resources into command economy structures.

Recession reared its ugly head in 1921. The economy of North America took a nosedive and shrank by a much larger percentage than it did during the Great Depression. What caused the recession? The sudden halt of wartime production was a major reason. U.S. manufacturers had large inventories of goods that the consuming public simply could not absorb. American exports fell sharply at the end of the war. Add to that a massive influx of labor due to the returning troops. Read Full Story

Can you believe it’s been more than 35 years since the first of the great General Services Administration sales of silver dollars began in 1972? Of course, if you’re younger than 50 or so, then you probably know of the sales only through reading about them.

For me and the thousands of other bidders in the sales, it was the chance of a lifetime, although we didn’t realize it at the time. We were taking part in one of the signal events in the history of coin collecting in America - the dispersal of one of the greatest hoards of all time.

Technically, it was merely the continuation of the hoard’s dispersal, as the Treasury had been doling out its massive stockpile of silver dollars to interested parties for years before the GSA sales. However, in the early 1960s, this depletion accelerated enormously.

According to Leroy Van Allen and A. George Mallis’s Comprehensive Catalogue and Encyclopedia of U.S. Morgan and Peace Silver Dollars, “The Treasury holdings of silver dollars in Washington, D.C. dwindled from 180 million in January 1960 to 28 million on January 1, 1964.” Rumors of older Morgan dollars being released in addition to the more common Peace type resulted in a further run on the Treasury, which responded by calling a halt to sales on March 26, 1964. Read Full Article

After nearly four months of readers searching, a second example of a major 1982 doubled die reverse cent has finally been uncovered. Numismatic News reader Jim Proctor of Vermont reported it. It bears the small date obverse and is struck on a pure copper-plated zinc core planchet - as was the original find.

Author Charles D. Daughtrey first revealed the existence of the variety to NN readers in a front-page story in the Oct. 2, 2007, issue, crediting Richard J. Ziegler of Massachussettes for the discovery. It represents the second strongest doubled die reverse known on the Lincoln Memorial cent, second only to the major 1983 doubled die cent.

Proctor said that he first became aware of the variety when he saw the NN story in late September 2007. A few weeks later, in late October, he decided to locate some rolls of 1982 small date zinc cents that he had put away back in the early 1980s. They represented coins grading anywhere from almost uncirculated to brilliant uncirculated that he had pulled from circulation on a daily basis and saved in rolls. Read Full Story

A cautious but upbeat assessment of the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild and its impact on people outside the coin collecting hobby who would demand certain coins be returned to their place of origin due to their being cultural patrimony was given Jan. 12 at a meeting of the ACCG during the New York International Numismatic Convention.

“Through the year we really got good publicity,” said ACCG Director Wayne Sayles. “We finally have an even playing field and the ability to push back.”

By pushing back Sayles meant against foreign governments and professional archaeological groups that have demanded coins these groups deem to be “ancient” of Cyprus, Italy, and China be returned to those countries because the coins are their cultural patrimony. Similar demands have been made in recent years regarding antiquities as well. Read Full Article

The No. A251-1-A $5 Red Seal on The First National Bank of Paintsville, Ky., shown here is a remarkable and historically significant find. It was ferreted out by Kentucky collector Richard Deavers.

Notice that it bears Treasury sheet serial A251, the as-yet lowest recorded Red Seal Treasury serial number from any sheet combination. It is from the second printing of $5 Red Seals delivered to the Comptroller’s office, a delivery that arrived on April 21, 1902, consisting of bank sheet serials 1 through 150. The first 100 of them were sent to the bank that same day.

The First National Bank of Litchfield, Minn., charter 6118, received the first printing of 5-5-5-5 Red Seals, delivered to the Comptroller on April 18. It was just a fluke that the $5 paperwork for the Litchfield bank preceded that of Paintsville. Read Full Story