 COINS FOR SALE
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||
1787 Massachusetts Penny by Callender SOLD
1787 Massachusetts Penny by Callender There were several discussions and committee meeting on the issue of a coinage by the Massachusetts Government and it was finally decided, based on the figures in a committee report, that the Commonwealth should own the mint and keep the profits from its operation. On October 16, 1786,"An Act for establishing a Mint for the coinage of Gold, Silver and Copper" was passed in the House of Representatives and on the 17th. was passed in the Senate and approved by the Governor, authorizing the construction of a state owned mint. The dies for the Massachusetts coppers were first produced by Joseph Callender, an engraver located on State Street in Boston, who had apprenticed at Revere's shop. In mid 1788, the state decided Callender's fee of 24 shillings per die was overpriced, so they gave the contract to a young twenty-two year old engraver in Newberry port, Jacob Perkins, who accepted a fee of one percent of all the coins struck using his dies. According to Crosby Perkins's dies can be distinguished from Callender's in that Perkins used a closed letter S that looks somewhat like an eight, while the earlier dies by Callender have a distinctly open letter S. Over the life of the mint, Perkins produced twenty six dies for which it has been estimated he received £3 18s or 3s per die. We do not know if Callender's charge was per die or per pair of dies, even assuming it was per pair of dies his fee per die would be 12s, substantially more than Perkin's 3s! Massachusetts coppers were well received and although the mint closed later that year due to lack of copper, the existing 1787 and 1788 pieces stayed in circulation for several decades. They were made on good quality copper planchets and were well struck. Also, whereas several of the private mints of the confederation era would cut costs by issuing lightweight coins, the Massachusetts mint continuously produced coins at their full legal weight. The total Massachusetts output was stated to be £1,048 2s7d worth of coppers, which based on a rate of 6s to the Spanish dollar equates to just under 3,500 Spanish dollars. |
Shopping Basket
Note: All prices in US Dollars
|
|||||||||||||||||||||
Coins For Salecoins@coinsforsale.org |
||||||||||||||||||||||
