NNP: THE 1976 LIBERTAS AMERICANA RESTRIKE

The 1976 Libertas Americana Restrike

The Libertas Americana medal is perhaps the most celebrated in the American series and is placed first in Whitman's 100 Greatest American Tokens and Medals. Although not approaching the number of restrikes of the Washington Before Boston medal, the Libertas has seen its share of copies. The most prominent among these was accomplished by the Paris Mint, in conjunction with First Coinvestors, Inc. in 1975. The massive 3 silver planchet, 0.925 fine, weighed 8.04 troy ounces and required at least six strikes to fully render the detail. Louis Sass, in the July 1990 Numismatist, noted a production of five trial strikes in copper, 500 pieces in silver (marketed at $250 each), and three examples in gold.

 

The two-page ad taken by First Coinvestors in the July 9, 1975 edition of Coin World artfully worded the production method, not from original dies, but rather the same mint and from the exact design. The 1976 restrikes were struck from copy dies, adapted from the original dies still extant in the Paris Mint. We also learn that the original strikes are priceless collectors' items, and that the original appearance of the Libertas caused such public fervor that there was hardly a farmhouse anywhere in France that did not have an enlarged cloth reproduction of Libertas Americana hanging in a place of special honor within the home.

Despite the breathless copy, the medal was well-done, and John Adams pronounced it a worthy replica of the matrix in Comitia Americana and Related Medals (2007). Examples today are valued in the mid-three figure range, with an MS67 example from the Martin Logies collection recently sold by Stack's Bowers for $660 in their March 2023 U.S. Coins Auction (lot 9008).

Image: 1976 Paris Mint restrike of the Libertas Americana medal, image courtesy of PCGS Coin Facts.

Link to Medal of Friendship and Thanks, by Louis C. Sass:
https://archive.org/details/Numismatist1990July/page/n59/mode/2up

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