Q.David Bowers
On August 3, 1964, an act was passed which provided that 45 million additional dollars be struck of the Peace design. On May 5, 1965 President Lyndon B. Johnson ordered that they be struck. At the Denver Mint 316,076 pieces were made. Although striking of the silver dollars occurred in 1965, they bore the date 1964. At the same time the country was dropping silver coinage and switching to the new cupro-nickel standard. It was decided that only a few of the 1964 Peace silver dollars, if released, would actually reach the public. Most would be seized by collectors and speculators or would be otherwise hoarded. According to later Mint announcements, all of the 1964 Peace dollars were melted down. The legend persisted that some had been saved.
A letter from Denver dealer Dan Brown, reprinted in the author's book Adventures With Rare Coins, sheds some light on the subject and affords an interesting speculation: I was talking with Fern Miller a few years back when she was director of the United States Mint here in Denver. She was telling me that when the order came stating that the Denver Mint was to make the new Peace dollar everyone at the Mint was elated. They set up the machinery for it, and at the proper time struck a large quantity. As has been the custom throughout the years, Mint employees were each allowed to buy two of these new dollars. Quite a number of the Mint employees took advantage of it and bought two pieces each. Soon afterwards, word came in from Washington that they were not to strike any more dollars, and that if any had been given out they were to be taken back and held until further orders, which probably would mean that the coins would be melted down at a future date.
Mrs. Miller did mention the fact that she thought everyone who had purchased the dollars in the morning they were first coined turned them in, but as no record was kept of the purchasers, there really was no way of knowing for sure. So, as a result, there possibly are some of the dollars still in existence. These may show up in future years. Of course they would be great rarities. I don't think that the Mint could declare them illegal under the circumstances and confiscate them, although this is a legal point.
savings, for the coin could withstand many years of use in circulation, whereas a paper currency dollar had a useful life of only about 18 months.
Trade Dollars (1873-1885)
Trade dollars, first called commercial dollars, were struck in pattern form beginning in 1871. Shortly before that time American trade with the Orient had increased considerably. Chinese and other merchants disliked gold and refused paper money. Silver metal was preferred. Prominent in circulation throughout the Orient were dollar-size Mexican coins which weighed slightly more than standard United States silver dollars. To compete with the Mexican issues, Congress in the subsequent Coinage Act of 1873 authorized the trade dollar to weigh 420 grains and consist of nine-tenths silver. The standard silver dollar weighed 412 1/2 grains and was made of the same alloy.
The first commercial dollar patterns were made in 1871 and employed the seated Indian princess design earlier engraved by James B. Longacre. In 1872 additional patterns were made employing designs by Longacre, Barber (who copied the Longacre motif), and Gobrecht (the regular Liberty seated silver dollar obverse of the year).
In 1873 many more varieties of pattern trade dollars were made. Some of these were undoubtedly struck with the correct intent in mind, to eventually formulate a design for use in circulation. However, the majority seem to have been capricious combinations of dies struck to enrich privileged insiders at the Mint who quietly sold them to dealers and collectors.
In its adopted form the trade dollar design consisted of Liberty seated on bales of merchandise at the seashore. The reverse displayed a perched eagle grasping arrows and an olive branch. Although trade dollars were legal tender in the United States up to the amount of $5, virtually the entire production of the first several years was shipped abroad. In 1873 the American Journal of Numismatics reported:
We were shown yesterday at the works of Morgan & Orr, 1219 Calowhill Street, the new coining press, just built by them for the purpose of coining at the San Francisco Mint all denominations of silver and gold coinage, but especially the new silver trade dollar ordered by the Department of the Mint.
This new machine weighs 18,000 pounds and is made entirely of the best steel, iron, and brass produced in Philadelphia. The steel plate above the coinage stamp is homemade and equal, if not superior, to the finest English, a fact that speaks well for our Philadelphia industry. The beautiful heavy brass beam was cast seven times over to secure its accuracy and exactness as well as finish and strength. The large flywheel is cast hollow and loaded with base metal so as to give it additional weight to counterbalance a heavy brass beam. This flywheel is cast in sections and securely united. In the front of the machine is a finely made brass cylinder to hold the unstamped coin which, as the wheel revolves, slip one at a time upon the sliding bedplate of iron with apertures made to receive a single coin, then drawn into the machine, the stamp descends, and the new trade dollar is carried out complete by an interior inclined plane. The heavy brass beam referred to of course controls the stamp. Perfect simplicity characterizes the machine, which is 21/2 times beyond the capacity of any other coining machine that the firm ever made for the government. It is capable of striking eighty $20 gold pieces equal to $1,600 per minute, or twenty silver trade dollars in a minute.
During the first several years coinage of trade dollars was done at the Philadelphia, Carson City, and San Francisco mints. In 1873 and 1874 the pieces met with an enthusiastic reception abroad. At the Calcutta Mint in India 233,000 trade dollars were received during the first three months of 1874. In Peking, China, it was announced that the trade dollar would be the official coin for trade in that country and would replace the Mexican silver peso of lighter weight.
Demand for the trade dollar continued in 1875. During that year Superintendent LaGrange of the San Francisco Mint noted:
At no time since the commencement of the present calendar year has the mint been able to accumulate a surplus of trade dollars, and the public demand has not been fully met. The limited capacity of the Mint and the unusually large coinage of gold, which is given precedence over silver, has materially abridged the supply of this international coin at San Francisco, but the favorable introduction of the trade dollar into China has most effectually destroyed the use of the Mexican silver dollar as the medium of exchange between this city and the ports in the Chinese Empire. The city banks report an excessive demand for trade dollar exchange. The coinage capacity of the new Mint, shortly to be occupied, will, it is hoped, fully meet the requirements for all gold and silver coins. Great care has been given in the manufacture of the trade dollar to reach the closest approximate perfection in assay value, weight, and execution ....