What coin was struck in 1933, but wasn't monetized until 2002? Hint:
It's gold, and it brought $7,590,020 at auction
Coin Values - By Mark Ferguson - February 20,
2007
The
monetization of coins has been the center of legal attention for about a decade
because of one particular coin: the 1933 Saint-Gaudens gold $20 double
eagle.Mint officials have long claimed that the entire 1933 production of
445,500 double eagles was never officially issued through accepted channels or
monetized, therefore no one could have legal title to such a coin.
 |
| 1933 Double
Eagle |
The $20 double eagles were
struck just as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt had ordered an end to the
production of gold coins and ordered all gold coins withdrawn from circulation.
For example, 68 percent of subscribers collect Franklin half dollars and
pre-1999 Washington quarter dollars; 67 percent collect Jefferson 5-cent coins
and Winged Liberty Head dimes; and 66 percent collect Lincoln cents, Indian
Head cents, Walking Liberty half dollars and Peace dollars.
The Mint
held that position even as it acknowledged that a few 1933 Indian Head gold $10
eagles, struck a little earlier than the 1933 double eagles, were legally
issued as money before FDR's executive order was issued. The Mint held the 1933
double eagles for about four years before all of the pieces were melted except
for two presented to the Smithsonian Institution (without the pieces being
monetized). As far as the Mint knew from 1937 to 1944, the two coins at the
Smithsonian were the sole survivors.
