Q. David Bowers
The Debut of the Liberty Seated Dollar
The Cabinet Collection of the Mint of the United States, by Mint Director James Ross Snowden, 1860, p. 111, told of the coinage of 1840 Liberty Seated dollars:
"On the 21st of July, 1840, the new dollar made its appearance. The obverse is the same as the dollar of 1836, with the addition of 13 stars. The reverse has the eagle, with expanded wings, bearing the United States shield upon its breast, and grasping an olive branch in the right, and three arrows in the left talon. Legend. 'UNITED STATES OF AMERlCA' .. .'ONE DOL.' The edge is grained, being the first authorized dollar bearing such an edge.:"
The Liberty Seated Design
The following description of the 1840 silver dollar is from the Catalogue of Coins, Tokens, and Medals in the Numismatic Collection of the Mint of the United States at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, by T.L. Comparette, curator, 1914:
"Obverse. Liberty, wearing Greek chiton, with neck and arms bare, seated to right upon a rock, the head turned to left; she holds in left hand a pole surmounted by Liberty cap, the right hand supporting the shield of the United States which rests upon the ground by her side; across the shield is a scroll inscribed LIBERTY; beneath, 1840.
"Reverse. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. An eagle, with wings displayed inverted; an olive branch in right claw and arrows in left; below, ONE DOL. Reeded edge."
In 1914, the Mint Collection contained one each of the Philadelphia issues in the Liberty Seated dollar series from 1840 through 1873, but no mintmark varieties.
The Year 1840 in History
The number of banks in the United States reporting to the Secretary of the Treasury was 661 in 1840 or, counting branches of banks, 901. These banks had loans outstanding in the amount of $462 million and possessed specie (coin) in the sum of $33.1 million. Capital stood at $358.4 million, and notes of the banks in circulation amounted to $106.9 million. Although various states had regulations affecting the issuance of paper money by banks, in practice many financial institutions were poorly capitalized, had few real assets, and issued paper money which in the entirety of its issue the banks could not redeem. In 1840 the effects of the Panic of 1837 were still being felt, and although recovery was underway, many areas of business and finance were uncertain.
The presidential election went to William Henry Harrison, the hero of the Battle of Tippecanoe, who captured 234 electoral votes to former President Martin Van Buren's 60. "Tippecanoe and Tyler, too" (Tyler became vice-president) had been a rallying campaign cry.
Temperance, abolition of slavery, and women's rights were three prime social causes, with abolition in the fore-front. Numerous tracts were circulated, books published, and speeches given on these subjects. In London an anti-slavery convention attracted worldwide participation. William Lloyd Garrison, well-known Boston abolitionist, boycotted it to protest the exclusion of women, two causes in one. In America the abolitionist movement split into two groups, one excluding women and the other admitting them.
Temperance was the concern of many who sought to improve society, just as ecology would become an important aspect a century and a quarter later. Green's Temperance Eating House (located at #2 Wall Street, New York City, in the early 1840s) was an example of one of many public establishments that catered to those who did not approve of the use of alcohol. At the same time, temperance advocates were eager consumers of bitters and other patent medicines, many of which (such as Drakes Plantation Bitters, c. 1860-1885) were liberally laced with rum or whiskey. Taking alcohol as a "medicine" Or to otherwise improve one's health was different, apparently, from drinking it and enjoying the experience. Drinking for pleasure in 1840 was like engaging in sex for pleasure; heaven forbid! But, many' did it anyway. More and more, as years wore on, extremist "temperance" advocates misused the term to mean total abstinence instead of its proper sense of moderation. The war on "Demon Rum" was the nineteenth century's equivalent to the twentieth century's war on drugs; its triumph in Prohibition led to its defeat.
Canals formed the main focus for investment and development interest in the transportation sector, and about 3,300 miles of waterways were in service (as compared to an estimated 2,800 miles of railway operated by about 300 different companies; obviously, most rail lines were quite short). During the next two decades, railroads would be in the ascendancy and canals would gradually become obsolete. Track gauges varied widely, there were no standards in place, and it was not unusual for merchandise to be transferred several times to different cars during the course of a long trip.
New Orleans, the site of an operating mint since 1838, was America's fourth largest city and by the end of the decade would overtake New York City as the nation's prime shipping port, when more than half of the exports from the United States left via its harbor. Mississippi River trade continued to increase, with over 200 steamers in service. New York City in the 1840 census was listed as having 312,000 inhabitants, a sharp increase from 124,000 in 1820. Most of mid- and upper Manhattan was still farmland and woods. Some 90% of Americans lived in rural areas. Most citizens stayed at home, and it was not unusual to find an octogenarian who had never traveled beyond the limits of his or her state. The national population amounted to 17,069,453 according to the decennial census.
On March 31, 1840, a 10-hour limit on daily working hours was set for government employees, but labor and safety regulations in government and in the private sector were virtually nonexistent. 1840 would begin a decade of expansion, and as the country emerged from the financial difficulties ex-emplified by the banking and currency situation of 1837 and successive years, many new factories would be built to utilize New England's seemingly limitless supply of water power. Workers would be scarce for the textile mills and other manufacturing enterprises, but Canada proved to be a source for young women and others who came to Massachusetts and other states to work by day in factories and stay at night in company-supplied housing.
In England, Queen Victoria, on the throne since 1837, married her first cousin, Albert. Victoria's "young head" portrait graced various coin denominations from the farthing (1/ 4 of a penny) upward. In the same country, the first adhesive postage stamps went on sale in 1840. Known as "penny blacks," the stamps were printed by Jacob Perkins, formerly of Newburyport, Massachusetts, where in 1800 he had produced the famous "He is in Glory, the World in Tears" Washington funeral medals. Perkins had for years been developing sophisticated security systems for the printing of bank notes in America, England, and elsewhere. Counterfeiting of bank notes was endemic, and while it gave rise to a whole class of periodicals known as "counterfeit detectors," it hurt the public. Estimates of spurious notes in circulation ranged from 10% to 25%. Under certain states' banking laws, or under the lack of enforcement thereof, all one needed was some printing plates and paper to turn out a flood of worthless currency. Contemporary literature reveals that certain banks located in Michigan were especially notorious. Many could not even be located to present notes for redemption; the bank office addresses were in nonexistent towns.
In the field of literature, both James Fenimore Cooper's The Pathfinder and Richard Henry Dana's Two Years Before the Mast reached print. Dana based the story on his 150-day trip to California around Cape Horn on the Pilgrim in 1834 and his return voyage aboard the Alert in 1836. American magazines were primarily monthlies, with the more sophisticated ones reprinting articles from English journals. Although many Americans were functionally illiterate, those with an education were apt to spend evenings in the parlor by the stove or fireplace, reading by the light of a whale-oil lamp. Whaling was a major industry, and such New England ports as New Bedford and Newburyport (Massachusetts) and Wiscasset (Maine) grew wealthy on the trade.
Belgian instrument maker Antoine Joseph Sax invented the saxophone (in the twentieth century, Guillaume Bax, also of Belgium, would invent the baxophone but it never became popular). The polka was introduced into the United States. Manufacturing of the McCormick reaper began, opening the way to the development of the plains states and the revolutionizing of American agriculture. In Boston the Durgin Park Restaurant opened, and in New Orleans Antoine's had its beginnings in the Pension Alciatore. Later, Antoine's would become famous for its Oysters Rockefeller, but in 1840 the name "Rockefeller" would not have been familiar to anyone, nor did anyone know much about petroleum (the source of the Rockefeller fortune).
In numismatics there were no organized societies, and in all of America there were probably no more than a few dozen serious collectors. The center of activity was Philadelphia, where Mint officials were pleased to welcome numismatists who cared to come to visit the Mint Cabinet or to acquire Proofs and other coins, which were obligingly furnished at face value.
There were no coin dealers per se in the United States, but bankers and bullion dealers filled the gap. Indeed, these (and occasional numismatists who cared to trade) were nearly the exclusive source of rare specimens acquired by the Mint Cabinet during this period.