America's Silver Dollars.
John M. Kleeberg, ed.
Coinage of the Americas Conference
Proceedings No. 9 (New York, The American Numismatic Society 1995) illus.
ISBN 0-89722-257-1.

NEWMAN, ERIC P. The Dollar $ign: Its Written and Printed Origins.

British traders and merchants moving into West Florida and Louisiana after the change of ownership in 1764 are shown to have converted the Spanish symbol (pS) for the coined peso into a convenient ligature form beginning about 1768, thus creating the $ sign. The first conventional $ sign in type is traced to 1799 rather than to a 1797 symbol of different makeup. The early uses of the $ sign are illustrated and explained.

BRESSETT, KENNETH. 1795 United States Silver Dollar with Official Plug.

The author describes a new discovery - the practice of putting a silver plug in the center of U.S. dollars of 1795. Clearly done at the mint, it was evidently accomplished by putting a silver tack through the planchet prior to striking; the author suggests this as a means of bringing underweight planchets up to standard.

STARK, ROBERT. Countermarked and Overstruck Early U.S. Dollars.

The author, in process of assembling a corpus of countermarks on early U.S. dollars, reviews the practice and provides interesting examples. Several reasons for countermarking are adduced, including advertising and revaluing for local use. Dollars countermarked or overstruck for use in the Caribbean and Latin America are described and illustrated.

MALLIS, A. GEORGE. The Development of the 1878 Morgan Silver Dollars.

The author who, with Leroy C. Van Allen, compiled the standard reference work on Morgan dollar die varieties (Comprehensive Catalogue and Encyclopedia of Morgan & Peace Dollars, 3rd ed., Virginia Beach 1992), discusses the original design of the Morgan dollar of 1878 and the numerous revisions it underwent. Over 100 die varieties are known for 1878.

KLEEBERG, JOHN M. The Silver Dollar as an Element of International Trade: A Study in Failure.

The author reviews the evidence for the circulation of the United States silver dollar overseas, including literary evidence, countermarks and overstrikes, and hoards. He discusses why the United States silver dollar did not circulate extensively, and concludes that the small issues of the United States were swamped by the large issues of Mexico. Furthermore, so long as the Mexican silver dollar and the United States silver dollar were legally equal (until 1857), there was no incentive to bring Mexican silver dollars to the U.S. Mint for recoinage; a businessman would have lost interest on his money if he had done so. The only reason to bring silver coins to the mint was if they were mutilated; thus much cut money was recoined.

NEWMAN, ERIC P. A Restated Opinion on the Origin of the 1804 Dollar and the 1804 Eagle Proofs.

A new reason why the 1804 dollar and 1804 U.S. Eagle were coined in 1834 for presentation sets is presented. It is pointed out that no device punches for either the obverse or reverse of the dollar or Eagle denominations had been made for 30 years and that to match existing 1834 coinage designs it would have taken extensive extra work and much more time to engrave new device punches. Thus it was more convenient to use the old available device punches of a different design to create dies for these desired denominations, even though back-dating the coins was illegal.

KLEEBERG, JOHN M. A Pair of Morgan Dollar Dies in the Collection of the American Numismatic Society.

The author publishes two cancelled dies for Morgan dollars (1883, Carson City mint). The dies bear numbers on their sides: 17 for the head die, 14 for the eagle die. The author discusses the significance of these numbers in the light of current estimates of the number of dies used to mint the 1883-C dollars, namely ten obverse dies and ten reverse dies.

REIVER, JULES. The Early United States Silver Dollars.

The author provides an overview of U.S. bust dollars with emphasis on some of the more unusual varieties.