Publisher's Synopsis
Award-winning researcher Michael Moran (author of Striking Change: The Great Artistic Collaboration of Theodore Roosevelt and Augustus Saint-Gaudens), joined by gold-coin specialist Jeff Garrett, chronicles the trials and tribulations of the U.S. Mint in the first half of the 19th century and the tremendous impact that the 1848 discovery of gold in California had upon that institution and the nation as a whole. From early struggles for adequate facilities and machinery for coining in Philadelphia to dramatic political debates waged in Washington, D.C., the remarkable evolution of the Mint and the country's coins and medals has never before been explored in such detail.
