Last week, in a side note about the 1833 Liberia token, I wrote:
A search for information on the Liberia token itself did turn up an extensive article by Randy Snyder in the September 2006 issue of Penny-Wise, the official publication of early American Coppers,
Inc., but it had nothing to say about who struck the pieces
Bob Leonard writes:
You skimmed over this article too fast. See p. 208; Snyder mentions three possibilities, and John Gibbs and Co. is obviously the correct one. Snyder says that they were actually made for
circulation in the United States, not Liberia; the U.S. Mint would never have gone along with that, and importing them from England makes little sense since there was a suitable maker in New
Jersey.
I did read the part about their circulation in the U.S., but missed the section on their manufacture. Thanks. -Editor
Ed Hohertz writes:
Josef Neumann wrote about the 1833 copper cent of Liberia in his seven volume work on copper coins written in 1863 (v. III p119-20 21277). After a description of the token and a brief history of
the Colony, a reference is given to Blätter für Münzkunde 1835. 1 Band. Blatt 16 which states in German: 'Diese Münze ist geschlagen in dem Dorfe Belleville, 7 Meilen von Neu York in
Nordamerika, wo bedeutende Kupfer, serbergwerke und kupserwaarenfabriken sind.'
In English: 'This coin is struck in the Belleville village, 7 miles from New York in North America, where there are significant copper mine and copper goods factories.'
A search turns up a Belleville in New Jersey, just across the river from Manhattan. The mine was known as the Belleville mine at one time. The relevant article with a fascinating history is found
on Wikipedia.
This indicates that the piece was indeed made in America, just not at the U.S. Mint. Very interesting! -Editor
To read the complete article, see: Schuyler Copper Mine (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schuyler_Copper_Mine)
To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
QUERY: MINTMARKS ON U.S.-PRODUCED FOREIGN COINS (http://www.coinbooks.org/v21/esylum_v21n01a12.html)
Wayne Homren, Editor
The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization
promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org.
To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor
at this address: whomren@gmail.com
To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum
Copyright © 1998 - 2024 The Numismatic Bibliomania Society (NBS)
All Rights Reserved.
NBS Home Page
Contact the NBS webmaster
|