Creators Podcast
Episode #1
07.07.2024
I had a great time researching and creating a podcast episode about the origin story of the Saint-Gaudens double eagle gold coin.
After I read two amazing books, I wanted to combine the perspectives of several people who were directly involved in creating the new coins.
Book number one, was ‘Recollections of a Newspaperman,’ by former Director of the United States Mint, Frank Leach.
The second book was, ‘Illegal Tender,’ by David Tripp. Both books included amazing detail on how the new Saint-Gaudens double eagle coins came to be.
Frank Leach Meets President Roosevelt for the First Time
“All you want, Mr. President,” I said, “is the production of the coin with the new design, is it not?”
“Yes,” said he.
“Well, that I promise you.” – Frank Leach
We begin with Frank A. Leach and his first few weeks on the job as the new Director of the U.S. Mint.
Leach was appointed to his new job by the President of the United States, at the recommendation of the United States Secretary of the Treasury, George B. Cortelyou.
He served as the Director of the United States Mint from 1907 to 1909. Prior to moving to Washington D.C. to serve at the Mint, Leach was a newspaper publisher in Oakland, CA.
Once he retired from a journalism career, Frank Leach became the superintendent of the San Francisco Mint. His heroic efforts after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake to save the Mint building and the gold bullion that backed the nation’s currency helped earn him his new job at the U.S. Mint.
Creating the Saint Gaudens Double Eagle Gold Coin
There were a few driving forces behind the creation of these amazing coins.
The first being President Theodore Roosevelt. The second was the amazing artistic designs of Augustus Saint Gaudens, and the third was Frank A. Leach, director of the U.S. Mint.
In Frank Leach’s book, “Director of a Newspaperman,” he chronicled the first meeting with the President as being slightly shocking, but also motivating because he wants to help the President and do a good job at his new position at the Mint.
The President instructed Leach –
“I want enough of these coins within thirty days to make a distribution throughout the country, that the people may see what they are like.”
In his book, Leach describes his response,
I replied that we would be able to meet with his desire, although I explained that this issue would have to be struck on medal presses from the second design model, but that in a few weeks later we would have dies completed from model No. 3 with lower relief, so that the coins, when made, would meet the requirements of the bankers and business men in “stacking,” etc., and these could be struck on the regular coin presses in the usual way. The pleasure of the President was manifested in the heartiness of his thanks.
Needless to say, Frank Leach has a great start to his job as the Director of the United States Mint. He impressed the President right from the very start.
Roosevelt and Augustus Saint Gaudens
Now we move on to the amazing book, ‘Illegal Tender,’ by David Tripp. I read the book nearly in one sitting. The book goes into incredible detail on the entire history of not only the creators story of the coin, but also tracks the 1933 Double Eagle coin around the world for over 70 years.
The book opens with the President talking about how the U.S. coinage is of, “atrocious hideousness.” He fired those remarks off to the Secretary of the Treasury, Leslie Mortier Shaw, on December 27, 1904.
The President continued in his letter, “Would it be possible, without asking permission of Congress, to employ a man like Saint-Gaudens to give us a coinage that would have some beauty?”
Now, one thing to understand is that paper money, back in those days, was just not as big of a deal as it is today. It was all about the coins! people loved coins not just for collecting, but for everyday use.
In Tripps book, he explains how people still had greater faith in coinage, over paper bills. It was completely different than it was today. Coins were a, “quantifiable store of value,” as Tripp said. To suggest a coinage redesign was a truly important and significant undertaking. Something that every citizen in the country would notice, have an opinion on.
The Grand Vision of Roosevelt’s Coins
So President Roosevelt finally hatched his plan to re-design coins in the U.S. He would need a great artist, and would need to convince that artist that this was an undertaking they should agree to venture into.
There was a dinner planned at the White House where all the important Architects and bankers would attend. At this dinner, Augustus Saint-Gaudens would be honored, then the President would approach the artist about his plan.
Augustus Saint Gaudens was one of the most well-known sculptors and artists in the world at this time. To have him agree to join forces with the President for this important task would be a big early victory, and kick the venture off in the proper way.
The President made his pitch, and Saint Gaudens seemed reluctant at first.
The Challenge of the Coin Re-design
There were a few big challenges facing the coin re-design. The President had much energy, and lots of power to get things done. But Saint Gaudens knew to pass through the U.S. Mint, he would need to navigate an old-time nemesis. The Mint’s Chief Engraver. A man by the name of Charles Barber.
Barber was the son and grandson of former coin engravers. He was a solid engraver, but his artistic talents were lacking. Barber and Saint Gaudens already knew eachother well. It was a decade since their last encounter that left both men scathing over the other.
Another big challenge to convince Saint Gaudens to team-up and re-design American coinage was the simple fact that he was in his later years, and didn’t have the energy he once had in his youth.
His health had been slowly sliding downhill. And he had bouts of depression.
After deep thought, Saint Gaudens agreed to help the President.
The Big Coin Design Undertaking
It wasn’t since 1850 that the double eagle gold coin had been redesigned. The original double eagle was designed by James Longacre, and the coin enjoyed a long run of steady mintage for over 50 years.
Known, as the Liberty Head double eagles, they are also highly collectible coins. The super-rare 1861 Liberty Head double eagle sold for $7 million just a few years ago.
Now, the new Saint Gaudens double eagle gold coins would really need to make a splash to live-up to the old reliable Liberty Heads.
Saint Gaudens would study the ancient Greek coins after Roosevelt suggested he would like to try coins in high relief. While the artist had his doubts as to weather the Mint would be interested in such a feat, he was also up for the challenge, as long as Roosevelt seemed eager to carry the high relief torch.
Saint Gaudens describes his design intent to Roosevelt –
“For the figure of Liberty on the obverse, he liberally borrowed from both his own Sherman Monument and the Louvre’s Winged Victory of Samothrace, which had so greatly inspired him. He wanted to express Liberty not as a staid, unforgiving goddess but as “a living thing and typical of progress.”
With the assurance that Roosevelt has, “summoned all the Mint people,” and will push as hard as possible to see through the design, Saint Gaudens continues to talk about his design details.
Finally, the first sample coin is ready for production. But first Roosevelt had to make a visit to the Mint, and discuss matters with Secretary Shaw, who finally agrees to attempt a coin sample in high relief.
The Mint Press
One thing I found fascinating was the discussion of the equipment at the Mint used to strike a coin in high relief.
Saint Gaudens assistant, Henry Hering, provided large plaster models that were to be used for a reduced coin size sample from the ‘Janvier Lathe.’ This amazing piece of equipment was a new feature at the Mint, acquired from France just for the making of the new double eagles.
Not many people at the Mint were knowledgeable on the machine, especially not Charles Barber, but sooner or later, a high relief sample was finally produced.
Struggles With Barber
Saint Gauden’s health began to deteriorate, so trusted assistant, Henry Hering would step to make personal visits to the Mint.
But the Chief Engraver of the Mint was creating trouble for the President at every turn. The biggest problem, we suspect, for Barber was the fact that prior to Saint Gaudens, it was always the job of the Chief Engraver to design the coins. This was supposed to be Barber’s job.
And now, not only was he not able to do what everyone in history at his position was able to do, but to make matters worse he had to watch Saint Gaudens have the privilege of designing the coins.
The President stepped in. “I direct that Mr. Barber has the dies made as Mr. Saint Gaudens, with my authority, presents them.”
Barber would even go through the trouble of designing his own double eagle, but his coin design was completely ignored. Barber was totally outmatched by Roosevelt.
The Double Eagle Sample Coin
By December, 1906, Roosevelt finally caught a glimpse of the high relief sample coins. He was, “rapturous,” with excitement. The President directed the Mint, “that these dies are to be reproduced just as quickly as possible and just as they are.”
And this is one of my favorite lines from Roosevelt. In his excitement of the new coinage, he exclaimed to Saint Gaudens, “I suppose I shall be impeached for it in Congress; but I shall regard it as a very cheap payment!”
Finally, after a year and a half, Roosevelt, Saint Gaudens, Frank Leach, and Henry Hering prevailed with a tremendous high relief double eagle. Even though it took nine blows from the Mint press with 150 tons of pressure to make the finest details, it was now obvious what amazing art they had just created.
Now, the task was to figure out how to get this amazing sample coin in high relief into mass-production so the American people could see, feel, and touch it’s beauty up close.
Roosevelt Springs Into Action
After Augustus Saint Gaudens passed away in August of 1907, the President was more determined than ever to get the new coinage mass-produced at the Mint, so the American people could see the amazing work of Gaudens.
And even though he was gone, Saint Gaudens was able to marvel at the beautiful high relief coin that he designed.
Now it was time to get the workers at the Mint in gear, and get these coins produced by the millions.
October, 1907, there’s a very blunt meeting at the White House between President Roosevelt and Frank Leach.
David Tripp explains this meeting perfectly well in his book, ‘Illegal Tender,’ he says,
The even white line of his teeth peeked out as his mustaches bristled. But he was not smiling. He brought his fist down on his desk repeatedly, punctuating his sentences physically and shattering the calm of his office. Furious that his grand vision for a renaissance of American coinage was being stymied and sabotaged by a single malignant Mint employee, bitterly aware that his great goal would not be achieved the way he and Gus had envisioned it, Teddy was still determined to have his day.
As excited and animated as the President was that day at the White House, Frank Leach was not shaken. Even though he was the newly appointed Director of the U.S. Mint, he was completely unflappable.
He was on the President’s side, and willing to do what had to be done to convince the Mint to find a way to produce the coins.
An emotional Roosevelt now had to attend the memorial of Saint Gaudens, where he gave a heart-felt tribute to the great artist. The president delivered these words,
“Saint-Gaudens gave us for the first time a beautiful coinage, a coinage worthy of this country-a coinage not yet properly appreciated, but to which the official and popular mind will in the end grow. The first few thousand of the Saint-Gaudens gold coins are, I believe, more beautiful than any coins since the days of the Greeks, and they achieve their striking beauty because Saint-Gaudens not only possessed a perfect mastery in the physical address of his craft but also a daring and original imagination.”
The biggest problem at the Mint, other than dealing with the contentious Charles Barber, was finding the right relief to allow the presses to stamp each coin just once, instead of the eight or nine times it took for the ultra high relief sample coins.
Once the design was lowered a third time, the Mint was read for the presses to go into overdrive.
Frank Leach instructed the workers to go round-the-clock, where millions of coins poured out of the Mint.
The reaction was mostly positive, but Frank Leach didn’t sugarcoat the criticism so the President could have honest feedback from the American People.
Frank Leach Critique
It seemed almost everyone had an opinion of the new coinage.
One of my favorite exchanges of this entire story is between Frank Leach and President Roosevelt on the feedback of the reverse coin design.
The eagle soaring through the air, Frank Leach told the President, was just a copy that Saint Gaudens used from the 1857 penny. Now, with Leach beginning to offer his own opinion of the coin design, this is where it really gets interesting.
Disputing the Eagle’s Talons
Frank Leach continued, he told the President, the bird is flying with it’s talons extended backward under the tail feathers, instead of being drawn up under the bird in flight.
Leach said this was incorrect. But the President instantly disagreed. Roosevelt instructed Leach to go to Rock Creek Park and watch a real eagle in flight, and he’ll see the truth.
Not only did Leach not believe the President, but he did just what he told him, and went to observe an eagle in nature.
Instantly he saw that the President was indeed correct. The eagle flew just as the design showed on the coin. This must have been a humbling experience for Frank Leach, but nonetheless, he wrote about the entire exchange in his book. Luckily he did, because it’s one of my favorite tiny details of this entire ‘creators’ story!
In God We Trust Motto
There was a bigger uproar to the new double eagle coin design that gave the President some grief for just a short time, but it was intense.
There was no motto, “In God We Trust,” like most coins featured prior to this time. Letters poured into the White House, demanding the motto be added at once. Even questioning the President’s faith and moral judgement at the same time.
Roosevelt responded to the criticism and argued that perhaps U.S. coinage should not feature such a sacred phrase, for what if the coins are used in a immoral transaction? This would be obscene.
Little did the President know at the time, that the real reason the motto, “In God We Trust,” was left off the new coin design, was a simple oversight in the 1890 Coinage Act, where new rules and specifications were described in detail for each new coin design.
Among the list of phrases to be included on every single coin design, the drafts of the Coinage Act simple omitted the motto, “In God We Trust,” so when Saint Gaudens received the list of required design phrases, he didn’t include that particular phrase on the coin design.
It sounds like a simple clerical error to me, but at the time, the President was in damage control mode for a little while! The motto was quickly added to the double eagle coin moving forward once it was discovered what had happened.
David Tripp’s Amazing Book on the ‘Saints’
I absolutely loved reading David Tripp’s book, ‘Illegal Tender.’ I would strongly recommend you check out this book. It was my second time reading it, and I flew through it in just a few days.
The amount of research that Tripp put into this amazing work, it was astounding to read the crazy amount of detail.
Let me remind you, this ‘creators story’ of the Saint Gaudens double eagle coin is just the first chapter of David Tripp’s book! There is still an entire book left to go, and it covers the amazing hunt for the 1933 double eagle coin that lasts over 70 years!
And if you think I’m going to tell you how this entire story ends, I’m not going to! You need to read for yourself because it’s a thriller. If your a long-time coin collector, or simply a beginner who stumbled on this topic, either way, you will love this book I guarantee it.
Don’t forget about how these coins became so rare in the first place. Nearly 25 years after they were first produced, the great depression of the 1930s hit. And you won’t believe what the U.S. Government needs to do to keep the economy from total collapse.
I’ll give you one small hint, they must use all the gold in the entire country to try and prop up the financial institutions running the economy. And how would they do that? By recalling all the gold from American citizens, even gold coins!
So check out this book, and check out my podcast episode to get a feel for how this all went down. But most of all, go buy David Tripp’s book and enjoy a fascinating read. And please tell him I sent you!
Don’t forget to have some fun, and check out a few of my other rare coin collecting stories as well. There’s so much to discover, so best get going.