Q.David Bowers
Business in local saloons and other enterprises was often conductedby using pinches of gold dust. To remedy the situation and provide a convenience for miners, several assayers and coiners began business. George W. and Samuel Brown arrived in Denver in June 1860 and commenced the purchase of gold dust in a log structure. In the same month the firm of Turner & Hobbs opened for business.
The firm of Clark, Gruber & Co., Leavenworth, Kansas bankers, established a branch in Denver. From that beginning was to grow Colorado's largest mint, an operation which subsequently laid the framework for the government mint in the same city.
Austin M. Clark was born the son of John and Eleanor Clark in Brown County, Ohio, on October 14, 1824. Milton Edward Clark was born on May 6, 1827, in the same area. Austin lived until 1877, and Milton's life span ended in 1904.
Emanuel Henry Gruber was born in Hagerstown, Maryland, March 25, 1833. An interview with Emanuel Henry Gruber, then 71 years of age and a resident of Cripple Creek, Colorado, appeared in the The Denver Times in 1904 and gave in-formation concerning the firm's beginning and subsequent operations:
My firm was one of the heaviest purchasers of gold dust in the early days. When we bought a large quantity of dust we had to ship it to the states to have it coined into money.
This was a rather expensive proceeding, as there were only stage coaches and pony express reaching the city in those days, and we had to pay 5'70 of the value of the dust as an in-surance against loss in transit and another 5'70 expressage. Our dust was out of our hands anywhere from three weeks to three months, and often times the cash we would have in transit would total nearly $300,000.
This was considerable money to have and yet not be able to use for a month at a time, so one day the idea struck me that the firm of Clark, Gruber & Co., bankers, should also be coiners. I spoke to one of my partners, Austin M. Clark, who with his brother, Milton E. Clark, was interested in all my enterprises in those days, about the matter. He was a lawyer, and after spending several days looking up the authorities, he gave it as his opinion that there was no law of the United States which could be construed as against the coining of money by individuals, provided it was made of full weight.
Not entirely satisfied, I consulted two of the most prominent attorneys in the state of Kansas on this matter, and their opinion was the same as that of my partner, Mr. Clark ...
We went ahead then and ordered the machinery required in the coining of gold, and in 1860 built the old mint building, which still stands at the corner of 16th and Market streets, and having installed our machinery set to work to turn the dust of the miners into coin of our company.
Our gold differed little from those of Uncle Sam. We had the Goddess of Liberty on the face of them, but in the fillet that bound her hair, instead of the word "Liberty," we placed the word "Pikes Peak" and on the obverse side, instead of the words "United States of America," we stamped "Clark Gruber & Co." In this year we coined only $10 and $20 pieces [also $2112 and $5]. We made them of virgin dust, without any alloy, they were really worth more than those of the government, which were alloyed....
The next year we coined $2.50, $5, $10, and $20 gold pieces, but having found our pieces of the preceding year a little soft, as they were pure gold, we did not make the coins of 1861 as pure as those of 1860; still they were purer than the government coin. In 1862 we did not coin very much money, as the conditions were changed and the government greenbacks did not fluctuate as they did in the first years of the war.
Instead of putting the dust into coins this year we molded it into small bars, which we stamped with our firm's stamp, giving the value in ounces and its cash value. These ingots were accepted all over the world at their stamped value, some of them finding their way to Europe and even Australia.
When Horace Greeley came west in the early 60s, he visited our mint and, seeing the gold ingots lying on the counter, sent the following message to his paper in New York:
"Colorado is essentially a gold state. In the establishment of Clark, Gruber & Co. I saw immense quantities of gold bars lying on their counters. COME WEST."
In 1863 Uncle Sam bought our machinery and the mint building from us . . .
Besides gold pieces we issued greenbacks for the convenience of the miners, who did not wish to be weighed down with gold coin. These bills were always redeemed at their face value and did not fluctuate as did the government greenback, but were in reality gold notes, having the same value as the yellow metal itself.
Framework for the minting business was begun in December 1859 when Milton E. Clark journeyed to New York and Philadelphia to make arrangements in person to acquire coining and metal processing machinery. It is believed that Bailey & Co., Philadelphia jewelers, made arrangements for the dies. In the spring of 1860 Austin Clark and Emanuel H. Gruber arrived in Denver and purchased several lots on the northwest corner of McGaa and F Streets, later to become Market and 16th streets. An imposing 2-story brick structure with a stone basement was set up. In April the machinery arrived by an ox-drawn wagon. By July 16th the building was complete inside and out, and coinage operations were ready to begin. William Byers, editor of the Rocky Mountain News, received on July 20th this invitation:
We shall be pleased to have you visit our coining room and witness the process of stamping our first coin from Pikes Peak gold.
Very respectfully, Clark Gruber Inc.
On July 25th, the same Denver newspaper reported the visit:
In compliance with which invitation we forthwith repaired to the elegant banking house of the above firm on the corner of McGaa and F streets, and were admitted to their coining room in the basement, where we found preparations almost complete for the issue of Pikes Peak coin. A hundred "blanks" had been prepared, weight and fineness tested, and last manipulation gone through with prior to their passage through the stamping press. The little engine that drives the machinery was fired up, belts adjusted, and between 3 and 4 o'clock the machinery was put in motion and "mint drops" of the value of $10 each began dropping into a tin pail with the most musical "clink." About $1,000 were turned out, at the rate of fifteen or twenty coins a minute, which was deemed satisfactory for the first experiment.
The coins-of which none but $10 pieces are yet coined are seventeen grains heavier than the United States coin of the same denomination.
On the face is a representation of the Peak, its base surrounded by a forest of timber, and "Pikes Peak Gold" en-circling the summit. Immediately under its base is the word "Denver" and beneath it "Ten D". On the reverse is the American eagle, encircled by the name of the firm "Clark Gruber & Co.," and beneath it the date, "1860."
The coin has a little of the roughness peculiar to newness, but is upon the whole, very credible in appearance, and a vast improvement over "dust" as a circulating medium.