News Release

A Guide Book of American Silver Eagles, volume 27 in Whitman Publishing’s best-selling “Bowers Series” of numismatic references, debuts in December 2022, available from booksellers and hobby shops nationwide. Here, author Joshua McMorrow-Hernandez discusses his own introduction to American Silver Eagles, why the coins are so popular, and writing his newest book.

MY FIRST AMERICAN SILVER EAGLE

My introduction to American Silver Eagles came about in a most interesting way. My cousin, who also collected coins at the time, visited from out of town for a short summer vacation during 1993. So, there we were—along with my sister, herself a collector back then—three kids talking about coins as a shared interest during much of our cousin’s visit. My mom and dad, who encouraged my numismatic pursuits by purchasing hobby books and magazines, had heard about a fairly large local coin show that was happening during the week of my cousin’s visit. It was to occur over the course of four days, ending on a Sunday.

My family and I had never been to a coin show before. Sunday was our best day to attend for a couple hours in the afternoon—and the advertisement in that Sunday’s newspaper declared it was running from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.

The show was held in the event hall of a ritzy shoreside hotel in Sand Key, Florida. My dad drove us over and my mom, wanting to make sure we were at the right place, hopped out of the van to scope out the event. She walked into the hotel lobby and was back out before too long, visibly upset. The show manager had told her they were already closing up shop—that it was the last day and most of the dealers were heading home. My mom, armed with the newspaper advertisement, reasoned it was still at least two hours before the closing time.

She went back inside to talk with one of the club’s top brass and see if there was any way they could let us at least check out the bourse floor, if even for a short bit. She was inside the lobby talking with the club’s leaders for at least five or ten minutes. Soon, she returned to the van holding three silver coins in plastic flips and announced that the show manager had apologized for the situation. They wanted us to come in and visit with the few coin dealers who were still there—they’d stick around for us for the next half an hour or so.

As she announced this news to us kids, she passed out the three coins she had been given. She said they were called “Silver Eagles” and that they were brand new—dated for that year, 1993—and that we should save them. I had never seen such a large, heavy, or shiny silver coin; not even the cull Morgan dollar I had spent $5.50 to purchase a few months earlier, for my first twentieth-century type set, could compare.

Mom, Dad, and we three kids hopped out of the van and ventured onto the largely deserted bourse floor. I was after a handful of Lincoln cents for my 1909–1940 Whitman folder. Sis wanted a Peace dollar, and my cousin was looking for foreign coins. We visited two dealers. One gave us back in change a rag-condition 1957 $1 Silver Certificate, which was something I had never seen before. Another gave each of us a free vintage cull nickel. Mine was a corroded 1882 Shield nickel.

Mom introduced us to the officials who gave her the three American Silver Eagles, and we thanked them for the coins and for keeping the show open for us. They were very kind and encouraged us to stay interested in the hobby. And that we did, at least through our teen years. I ended up sticking with the hobby as an active collector the longest, though my cousin’s interest in foreign coins later parlayed into a globe-trekking career in journalism and the visual arts, while Sis still has her coin collection and is herself an artist.

Some years went by, and I was in college and trying to keep the debt at bay by selling off some of my belongings, including a swath of my coin collection. “Don’t sell that silver coin I got for you at that coin show!” my mom jokingly warned. “I worked hard for that!”

My dear mom passed away in 2009 from cancer, and I thankfully hung onto that American Silver Eagle—something I now view as a memento of how much she supported my ambitions, including numismatics. As my foray into the hobby morphed from collecting to writing, editing, and journalism, I have enjoyed researching American Silver Eagles, which hold a unique place in numismatics given their crossover appeal to both investors and collectors.

WHY PEOPLE LOVE AMERICAN SILVER EAGLES

The American Silver Eagle isn’t “just” a bullion coin. Even in 1986, when the first ones were struck, the coin was offered in Proof format and marketed to collectors. Over the years since, the United States Mint has produced the American Silver Eagle in myriad finishes and collectible variations suitable for numismatic tastes. But even the bullion issues (which were originally marketed as “Uncirculated”) draw countless hobbyists into building date sets.

These coins are legitimate collectibles on every front, encompassing rarity, value, and numismatic challenge. The bullion strikes boast several relatively scarce issues, including the key-date 1996 and several earlier semi-key dates that have lower mintages and conditional rarity in the higher grades. There are also some significant varieties, with the 2008-W Burnished, Reverse of 2007, a decidedly scarce entry. The undisputed “king” of American Silver Eagles is the 1995-W Proof, which has a mintage of just 30,125 pieces. But contending for that spot is the more recent 2019-S, Enhanced Reverse Proof, which saw an output of merely 29,909.

While the American Silver Eagle series boasts numerous expensive keys, semi-keys, and varieties, the series remains financially accessible. A handsome set of bullion strikes can be completed for an outlay fairly close to the prevailing spot price of the coins. Meanwhile, more intrepid collectors can work on a comprehensive set encompassing the many finishes and varieties. And collectors anywhere within that spectrum may choose to complete the set with coins in average Uncirculated or Proof grades, or go all-out on a competitive registry set incorporating certified coins boasting a “perfect” 70 on the numerical grading scale.

No matter the depth of your American Silver Eagle collection, sets like these represent an optimal merging of the bullion and numismatic spheres. The precious-metals investor who wants to dabble in collectibles can build a decent set of Silver Eagles for prices close to their metal value. Meanwhile, the hobbyist who wants to speculate in precious metals has a built-in silver portfolio by completing a set of American Silver Eagles.

Sweetening the deal even further is the outstanding liquidity of a set of American Silver Eagles. Not only are these popular silver bullion coins in high demand among United States collectors and dealers, but they also have global appeal and are quite sought after around the world.

Sealing the deal for many collectors is their colorful legacy. The American Silver Eagle incorporates one of the most beloved designs of all time, Adolph A. Weinman’s Liberty Walking motif. This graceful, patriotic design first appeared on the half dollar in 1916 and continued for the duration of that series until 1947. The Liberty Walking half dollar has become a favorite collectible and enjoys incredible demand among collectors of all ages.

Weinman’s design became a top choice for the nation’s first one-ounce silver bullion coin after President Ronald Reagan signed the Liberty Coin Act into law on July 9, 1985, authorizing production of the American Silver Eagle. The classic design was paired on the Silver Eagle with sculptor-engraver John Mercanti’s heraldic eagle reverse, which was retired in 2021 to make way for artist Emily S. Damstra’s soaring flying eagle design. Still, the timeless Liberty Walking design continues marching well into the twenty-first century.

AMERICAN SILVER EAGLES AND YOU

In the Guide Book of American Silver Eagles, I’ve explored all of these facets—the history, the artistry, the technology and design work, production, silver procurement, distribution, ways to collect and invest, and many more, including byways as strange and interesting as counterfeits, error coins, and hoards of American Silver Eagles.

I interviewed Mint officials, coin designers, dealers, collectors, investment advisors, silver miners, and others with specialized knowledge, and brought together a treasure trove of historical archives, plus market information and analysis.

The result is 384 pages covering America’s most famous and popular bullion coin series.

My hope is that you enjoy reading the Guide Book as much as I enjoyed researching and writing it. I think you’ll become as interested in these fascinating coins as I’ve been since I held my first American Silver Eagle thirty years ago.

The Confederate Treasury made a consequential decision upon its inception: to have the Register and Treasurer hand-sign each and every printed Treasury note. With the idea that this would deter counterfeiting and that the war would be short, this decision seemed reasonable. The first series of Treasury notes numbered a few thousand, all of large denominations – $1000, $500, $100, and $50 – and they were signed by Treasurer Edward Elmore and Register Alexander Clitherall. The U.S. Treasury decided to use machine printed signatures on their “green back” Treasury notes, so U.S. Treasurer Francis Spinner and Register Lucius Chittenden did no hand-signing. If the war were short, this decision to require hand signatures would have had little consequence. However, the war dragged on for four years, and in the end, the Confederacy printed over $1.5 billion in Treasury notes, many in small denominations of $1 to $20. This meant that the Confederate Treasurer and Register would have needed to sign nearly 80 million notes, totaling 160 million hand-signatures. This was clearly impossible for these two individuals, given all else that the Treasury needed to accomplish. So they established a Treasury Note Division to not only contract printing of notes but with clerks to sign, cut, number, date, and trim the notes. At first, the Treasury Department hired 19 men as civil servants, working in pairs, to sign notes. As the war progressed, however, many more men were hired. Indeed, with men needed in the army, the Treasury began to do what it never had before: hire women in government positions. Over the course of the war, the Confederacy hired 367 clerks to sign their Treasury notes, and many more to handle other Treasury jobs. By April 1864, all signing clerks were women. On final tally, about two-thirds of the 367 signing clerks were women, and of those women, about two-thirds were single. Many were young, in their teens or twenties. Most were of high social standing, privileged, educated, and with excellent penmanship. Financial need was important, but the clerkships typically went to a higher social class, often with nepotism.

What were the consequences of this decision by the Confederate Treasury to have two hand-signatures on each note? One consequence was an enormous administrative cost to the Treasury. We estimate that the Confederate Treasury spent about $75 million (adjusted to 2022 dollars) in salaries to the signers. Beyond this cost were salaries for other clerks that hand-numbered or hand-dated notes, and for the signing supplies including pens, ink, and clamps. Furthermore, having signing clerks required infrastructure, such as buildings, desks and other furniture, and salaries of chief clerks who managed the signing clerks. These costs significantly raised the cost of affixing two hand-signatures on every Treasury note. The Confederate Treasury recognized this cost in dollars and effort, and recommended to the Confederate Congress to allow it to machine print signatures. But Congress did not allow this. Why? One likely factor is that Congress considered the hiring of signing clerks as a form of welfare, of course for the upper class who found themselves in need. A second consequence of this decision to hand sign notes was not intended but was of enormous and long-lasting social consequences. The war-time Confederate government employment of Treasury ladies affected their roles and relationships at home, as it gave them experiences, opportunities, and responsibilities that women never had before. It also gave these women post-war work opportunities and choices that women before them never had. Would those Treasury ladies who were single take the more traditional role of young women and get married and raise a family? Or would they choose to continue working, for the government or in other occupations and careers? If they chose to pursue a career, would they also be able to marry and have children? Perhaps they would choose to sacrifice that path, or even consider it a liberation. Susan Barber showed that while white wage-earning women comprised only 1.6% of the free labor in the Richmond workforce in 1860, by 1870 this figure had risen to 9.9%. As for the Treasury ladies, after the war, many of them had significant public lives and exceptional accomplishments. Many continued careers with the government, either state or national. Others had careers as writers, educators, school administrators, scientists, inventors, and community leaders. Many never married. These women were highly representative, even leaders, in the social transformation that occurred in the post-war South. For example, Susan Archer Talley was a writer and artist, friend and historian of Poe, and Civil War spy and seductress. Etta Kelly was an entomologist, U.S. agricultural commissioner, founder of Charleston Female Academy, educator, and mentor. Amy Yates Snowden co-founded the Home for the Mothers, Widows, and Daughters of Confederate Soldiers, which provided support for poor female dependents of Confederate soldiers, and a school was established for their children, the Confederate Home and College. Mary Spear Nicholas Tiernan was an acclaimed writer of novels, poetry, and short stories including Two Negatives about the lives and loves of the Treasury ladies and co-founder of Woman’s Literary Club of Baltimore. Lizzie Elliott was a poet, teacher, and dean at Sam Houston State University. Henrietta Porcher Heriot worked in the U.S. Treasury Post Office and was a powerful role model for her daughters. Sanders Jamison, Chief of the Treasury-Note Bureau, in his report to Treasury Secretary George Trenholm on October 31, 1864, reflected on their experiment of employing women to do the work previously done by men. Jamison wrote, “In closing this report I must be allowed to speak in the highest terms of the ladies and gentlemen who have been associated with me in getting out the work of the office. The experiment of employing ladies in the public offices, first instituted by Mr. Memminger, has not only proved a perfect success, but has been the means of relieving the necessities of many who have been driven from their homes and have lost all by the barbarous cruelty of our inhuman foe.” Indeed!

---

The Confederate Treasury Notes: The Signers and Their Stories by Charles Derby and Michael McNeil highlights include…

• Introduction with a history of the Confederate Treasury Note Bureau and the professional activities of the Treasury note signers within it
• Original research on the 371 signers of Confederate Treasury notes, some of whom also signed bond coupons. The book includes photographs of the signers and their lives
• Section coupling an image of the signer’s signature and name for quick identification of the signer on any Confederate note
• Two-page list of signers for the Register and Treasury, updated from Thian’s Register
• Appendix with writings by and about the Treasury note signers
• Extensive bibliography
• Available as a 360 page soft cover book with perfect binding, 8½ inch by 11 inch

To order the book, send $49.95 plus postage ($5 domestic, $10 international) to Charles Derby, 204 Sycamore Ridge Drive, Decatur, GA 30030. Option to use Venmo or Zelle. For more information, contact charlesderbyga@yahoo.com.

Whitman Publishing’s new Guide Book of American Silver Eagles, by Joshua McMorrow-Hernandez, will debut in December 2022, available from booksellers and hobby shops nationwide. It is volume no. 27 in the best-selling “Bowers Series” of numismatic references. Here, Whitman publisher Dennis Tucker discusses the book and the popularity of American Silver Eagle coins.

The American Silver Eagle is one of the most popularly collected U.S. coins today—and it has some of the most passionate collectors. At Whitman Publishing headquarters we witnessed this in no uncertain terms in 2018.

That year, under pressure to fit more and more America the Beautiful quarters, commemoratives, and other content into the Red Book, which was already bursting at the seams, we made a radical change to our coverage of bullion coins: We condensed the book’s silver, gold, and platinum bullion from 21 pages into 8 pages. Instead of the usual highly detailed charts with mintages and pricing for each coin, we summarized each bullion program with a bit of historical information, a narrative giving typical price ranges for various formats (Proof, bullion strike, etc.), and brief descriptions and pricing for the key dates. The American Silver Eagles were trimmed down from two pages to one.

In hindsight, I can firmly say—the page savings were not worth it!

Almost immediately after the 72nd edition of the Red Book hit the shelves, we started getting phone calls and emails from alarmed collectors. “What happened to the Silver Eagles?” “The Red Book is where I always go for mintages.” “You’ve made a big mistake!”

It was the most vociferous, widespread, grassroots wave of feedback we’ve received on any Red Book subject in the nearly 20 years I’ve been Whitman’s publisher.

Determined to make things right, we quickly laid out the American Silver Eagles in their previous highly detailed format and created a PDF to email or mail to anyone who contacted us with a complaint. You can rest assured that in 2019, in the 73rd edition of the Red Book, the American Silver Eagles were back to their two full pages of complete coverage!

Today these popular (and staunchly defended) coins occupy about two and a half pages in the 76th edition of the Red Book, and we’re planning an expansion to four pages in the 77th edition, with pricing in more grades.

Avid collectors will be very pleased with Joshua McMorrow-Hernandez’s new Guide Book of American Silver Eagles, the latest in-depth reference on these coins. It joins John M. Mercanti’s American Silver Eagles: A Guide to the U.S. Bullion Coin Program, which has been a Whitman best-seller since its first edition debuted. Before Mercanti’s book was published in 2012, collectors had only hobby newspapers and magazines, online forums, and coin-shop and coin-show conversations to guide them in their collecting, along with the Red Book’s annual coverage of the latest coins and sets. There was no comprehensive book-length study.

Mercanti, working with professional numismatist Michael “Miles” Standish, brought personal insight to the study of American Silver Eagles—he was, after all, the designer and sculptor of the coin’s original reverse. Now Josh McMorrow-Hernandez, in the Guide Book of American Silver Eagles, expands the theme with even more historical information and interviews with Mint officials, silver-mine suppliers, CCAC committee members, active dealers, experienced collectors, investment advisors, and others involved in the nation’s best-selling bullion coin program. He brings a journalist’s hunger for answers and a market analyst’s focus on numbers, to show readers how to wisely build a valuable numismatic collection (or, if they prefer, how to spend intelligently as a bullion investor).

In the summer of 2022, I informally polled 114 hobbyists for their opinions on American Silver Eagles. The results were interesting:

• 41 percent identify themselves as either a collector or an investor (or both) in American Silver Eagles (4 percent active collector; 1 percent active investor; 9 percent active collector and investor; 12 percent casual collector; 4 percent casual investor; and 11 percent casual collector and investor).

• 39 percent own some of the coins, but don’t consider them a carefully assembled collection or a significant investment.

• 20 percent don’t collect or invest in them at all, and don’t own any.

Within these numbers we see a coin with broad presence in the hobby community. The data also show a population of casual buyers who might jump to more active collecting and investing.

It’s anecdotally informative to look beyond the numbers and learn collectors’ and investors’ opinions and the feelings inspired by the American Silver Eagle.

One collector of Liberty Walking half dollars said, “The ASE is a great way to see a fully struck, larger-sized Walker.” Another called them “one of the most beautiful coins of the 1900s, if not the most beautiful.”

One hobbyist buys “two every year to keep the set current. I’ll pass them to my two kids someday.” On a similar note: “Mainly I buy them every year to give out as Christmas presents to some relatives and to people at work.”

For some, buying comes down to price: “When I have extra cash, I get a few as bullion, but it depends on the premium.” “Highly recommend for investment. I go where the deal is. Both slabbed and raw. They are a really super deal vs. generic silver dollars, plus have more silver in them. I will not buy classic dollars at current prices.” And “They are fun to own, and I salt some away when silver is low.”

Of course, not every hobbyist is a fan of the American Silver Eagle. One young collector who favors Barber silver coinage said, “A coin has to be older than me to attract my attention.” A skeptic who doesn’t own any dismissed American Silver Eagles as “just more hunks of silver.”

Many, though, describe the coins as “fun,” and those lucky enough to own the series’ rarities love to talk about them. “Yes, I have the 1995-W . . . had it since 1996!” bragged one collector. Another reminisced, “I got the home-run from the Mint, the 2019 Enhanced Reverse Proof—which I traded for 13 Silver Eagles and an ounce of gold!”

Joshua McMorrow-Hernandez explores these angles of the American Silver Eagle and many more in his new book. This is a guide for the active buyer, a history for the numismatist, and an inspiration for those yet to join the field. Whether you’re new to silver bullion or a longtime collector or investor, you’ll find much to learn and profit from in the Guide Book of American Silver Eagles.