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The E-Sylum: Volume 12, Number 11, March 15, 2009, Article 16

FIRM OFFERS FANTASY'S BASED ON SMITHSONIAN'S CHARLES BARBER PUERTO RICO SKETCH

Rafael Valentin forwarded this advertisement for a limited edition of 100 fantasy strikings based on a sketch by Charles Barber for a proposed coin for Puerto Rico. The original sketch is in the holdings of the National Numismatic Collection at the Smithsonian.

Barber Puerto Rico fantasy


I asked Dick Doty of the NNC about this, and he writes:
We have the original drawings, and we used them in the display we did at the FUN show in 2007. It looks an awful lot like the Columbus half - Barber always was a hack - and the existence of the sketches is explained by the fact that in 1899, the date they bear, the status of Puerto Rico was unclear, and someone in Treasury decided it might be an idea to think about a coinage, just in case.

Note that the module of the coin would've reflected the absolute value of the silver, rather than the fiduciary value, as seen in the contemporaneous Morgan dollar.


Barber Puerto Rico sketch


The image of the sketch is taken from the Barber Coins web site: http://www.barbercoins.org/PR-sketch.JPG



Wayne Homren, Editor

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