US Mint Presidential Medals With D Mint Mark

Edward J

From the U.S. Mint information page:



Are you sure you don't have Presidential dollars?

Pictures would be helpful.

Hey Mr Seated and Mr Token:

What you are saying is exactly what I thought and so that is why I am startled enough to get some more light on this.

These are my very first pictures which I have uploaded to the net and I hope they work. I photograped the Washington Medal from each set for you to compare. I had to go look up how to upload them first and then went to the kitchen table and snapped the shot.

They seem quite common because there is always several open auctions with these. I wonder if the ones with the mint marks are more common than the ones without.

Thanks for your interest Gentlemen.

Looking at your edited pictures, the "D" on the Washington Medal definitely looks like it would be the designer's initial (who, as I said, had a last name beginning with a "D"). BUT there is still a question: Why then is the "D" not on both medals? One would expect it to be on both medals.

Yes reverses are the same. You have to remember that in one set all but 2 have the D mint mark. Maybe they have it hidden there in the design also but all of the rest have this D mint mark.

I understand that common knowledge says what both of you are saying and I also believed that. All US Mint medals are struck in Philadelphia and have no mint mark. Period. End of Report! It seems almost sacrilege to challenge this but what else can I say. I have changed the title of this so that it may attract some more opinions.

Let's see where this takes us.

I certainly did not think that these were worth the work to counterfeit a whole set of 40 presidents. But then we have to remember the price of labor in China. Now that you mention it this could be the answer.

Looking at the medals naked eye they appear in beautiful classic high relief with proof like fields. When you look at these pictures you start to see things which surely seem to indicate that they do not originate at the US Mint. I suppose that the US Mint is still standing for quality standards so high they could only come from an organization of such high standards. (LOL)

Notice the hair line scratches everywhere you look. Also I think that they both need another strike of the dies to finish off the high relief. Notice the highest relief points of the neck. They both appear porous instead of solid and full like on the President's hair piece. This means that the metal of the planchet has still not filled in the depth of the die to such a point that it is smooth and fully struck. As someone referenced above, when you so correctly pointed out that medals are sometimes struck multiple times to bring out the finest quality. This is an instance where another strike of the dies would apply enough pressure.

I used to work for a private mint back in the 70's for a year. I remember the boss looking at a specimen which came out of the first few impressions. I would stand there telling him how beautiful it was but he would hand it back to the press man who would set up the equipment to do another strike which would fill in this porous background. Only then would Mr. Lombardo allow the medal to be shown outside his factory with his name on it. I remember the stationary said "Renowned House of Medalist" which to him said quality. I digress.

Lets wait to see if new information is forthcoming.

I do notice the "D" pictured above has the look of a punch struck into a die, affecting the nearby fields.
Would a pressure-cast counterfeit show that detail? Or would a die-struck fake bother striking a mintmark into the die?

Would it help if I posed several other pictures of some other D mint medals in addition to the Jefferson you request. It will take a bit of time to set up the stuff so I'll check here when I get ready to go. I'll do what ever you suggest. Is the picture of the mint mark what you want to see more or less important to your line of thought or do you want both views?

I am not enthused where this is going so far but when you throw something out for discussion you have to be ready to go where ever it takes you. I just can not believe that they are worth making counterfeits of but perhaps I have been out of the circle long enough to not fully understand the extent of the counterfeiting problem. Please don't take offence but I will be trying to show enough photographic evidence to you that you will agree with me. I think eventually we will find that medals with the D are genuine mint products produced at Denver. I will take the pictures you want.

BTW -- I notice that these medals are not quite the same as I was used to. Each President has only one medal in these sets. If I remember correctly many times there was a medal for the first term and another for the second term of the president. I don't remember there being four for FDR though so no hard and fast rule.

Another thing I noticed with the Jefferson Medals (both sets) look like the writing around the edge looks like it came from a worn out die with the letters not as sharp or clean as they are on other medals.

I believe that there have been several mintings of the Presidential medals over a period of decades. I purchased a Lincoln medal in Springfield, IL as a kid in the early 1980s, this medal is also currently offered by the Mint. Notice that the designer was George T. Morgan of dollar fame, that design has been around for a while.

I would say that it is quite possible that there has been some minor variations in the minting of these medals over the years. The D on the Washington medal could be for the designer, Pierre Simon Duvivier.
http://catalog.usmint.gov/webapp/wc...ory_rn=10196