Foreign coins from US mint

[Robert]

Very good article in the July 19 Coin World on US-struck foreign coins.

Some facts from the article:
"Congress explicitly authorized coinage for foreign countries i n an act of Jan. 29, 1874, solely on that subject." (Congress really wanted to do this!) The practice (circulating coins) basically ended in 1984.

The first client was Venezuela in 1875-76. The first coins were 10 million 1-centavo and 2 million 2.5 centavo coins. Interestingly enough, they were a copper/nickel/zinc alloy that was not used in US coins, so the blanks were provided by the Waterbury Mint (private one) in Connecticut. Later clients were Dominican Republic (1877), Colombia (1881), Ecuador and Peru (1895), Costa Rica (1897), Cuba (1898, after the Spanish-American War I presume), Nicaragua (also 1898), Haiti and Panama (1904), Mexico (1906) and El Salvador (1909). I bet it would be relatively easy to acquire all these coins, most of which could be had in decent grade for not a lot of money. It would be an interesting set to have.

From 1874-1984, the US made 11.3 billion (with a "b") coins for more than 40 other countries.


Some VERY cool (at least to me) anecdotes:

-Mexican 20 centavo coins dated 1907 were minted in New Orleans using Mexican dies, "thus denying New Orleans its only opportunity to put its stamp on a foreign coin just before minting operations ceased in 1909."

-The "Panama Pill", 2.5 cent coin, was a Philadelphia product.

-Belgian 2-franc coins of 1944 were struck on 1943 cent planchets, "and some 1944 steel error cents may have been struck late in the year on planchets intended for the foreign coinage." So one of the US's great errors might owe its existance to foreign coins!

-Overdates exist... 1918/7 and 1919/8 Salvadoran 5-centavo coins were made in Philly... what's with all the overdates that particular year (1918)?

-Ecuador 1928 and 1930 silver coins have "PHILA. U.S.A." on the reverse instead of a "P". This is also 50 years before US coins started having the "P" mintmark. So this might be the answer to a trivia question, what country was the first to put a mark signifying "Philadelphia" on a circulating coin...?

-Brass Peru coins of 1943 used "salvaged shell cases", which foreshadowed the later use of shell cases on US cents. Guatemala, Nicaragua and Peru did that too.

-About half the 1968 Canadian dimes were made at Philadelphia. The "P"dimes' reeding was "flat-bottomed" while the Ottawa reeding is "V-shaped".

-"In 2003, NGC authenticated an 1877 IHC as being made on a Venezuelan centavo planchet of copper, nickel and zinc. It had previously been identified as a die trial piece. The question was raised as to whether other pieces long held in collections as dies (sic) trials migt offer up a similar re-identification."