50 Dollars, United States Assay Office of Gold, United States, 1851
date: label: date made
content: 1851
name: label: mint
content: United States Assay Office of Gold
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: One (1) 50 dollar coin
label: Description (Brief)
content: United States, 1851
label: Description (Brief)
content: Obverse Image: Eagle standing on a rock, holding a shield, with a ribbon in its beak.
label: Description (Brief)
content: Obverse Text: UNITED STATES OF AMERICA / AUGUSTUS HUMBERT UNITED STATES ASSAYER OF GOLD CALIFORNIA / 1851 / 887 THOUS / FIFTY DOLLS
label: Description (Brief)
content: Reverse Image: Engine-turned design.
label: Description (Brief)
content: Reverse Text: N/A
label: Description
content: As early as 1850, agitation began in Congress for the establishment of a San Francisco branch of the United States Mint. This action was blocked by people from New York-who wanted a branch in their own state-and from Georgia and Louisiana-who argued that any California operation would represent unfair competition to the branch mints in Dahlonega and New Orleans.
label: Description
content: The opposition won, and San Francisco would go without a mint for another four years. But it did get an odd sort of hybrid, the United States Assay Office of Gold, striking an odd sort of money-a gigantic, fifty-dollar ingot that would also do duty as a coin. The arrangement was made by the Treasury Department under a contract with Moffat & Company, private assayers and gold coiners in San Francisco.
label: Description
content: Augustus Humbert came west to oversee the operation, which got under way at the end of January 1851. For most of the next two years, Humbert's fifty-dollar "slugs" were the principal accepted currency in California. He was eventually allowed to turn his attentions to the production of smaller, and altogether more useful, coins, ten- and twenty-dollar pieces. And his operation finally laid the framework for a formal, normal branch Mint, which began the production of ordinary federal coinage in the spring of 1854.
place: label: place made
content: United States: California, San Francisco
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: National Numismatic Collection
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content: Coins
label: See more items in
content: Numismatics
label: See more items in
content: Coins, Currency and Medals
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content: Josiah K. Lilly Jr. Collection
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content: Legendary Coins
label: Exhibition
content: Value of Money
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
publisher: label: Related Publication
content: Zoomable Image and Details
label: Related Publication
content: Glossary of Coins and Currency Terms
label: Related Web Publication
content: http://americanhistory.si.edu/coins/glossary.cfm
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Estate of Josiah K. Lilly
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: NU.68.159.1142
label: accession number
content: 283645
label: catalog number
content: 68.159.1142
objectType: label: Object Name
content: coin
label: Object Name
content: ingot
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: gold (overall metal)
label: Physical Description
content: 0 (overall die axis)
label: Physical Description
content: 0 (overall die axis measurement)
label: Physical Description
content: struck (overall production method)
label: Measurements
content: overall: .5 cm x 4.2 cm; 3/16 in x 1 21/32 in