1854 Double Eagle Die Trial - Kellogg & Co., Copper

Coin Details

Auction Record

$80,500 MS64 01-03-2012 Heritage Auctions

Description

This copper die trial was produced from the dies of Kellogg & Company's twenty-dollar gold piece, one of the most important private coinages of the California Gold Rush era. John Glover Kellogg and Augustus Humbert — the latter having served as the United States Assayer of Gold in California — formed their partnership after the government assay office closed in late 1853, leaving San Francisco temporarily without a facility to produce large-denomination gold coins. Kellogg & Co. stepped into this void with their $20 pieces, which quickly gained wide acceptance in California commerce due to Humbert's established reputation for honest assaying. The obverse of the Kellogg double eagle features a Liberty Head portrait closely modeled on the federal Liberty Head design by James Barton Longacre, lending the coins an air of quasi-official authority. The reverse displays an eagle with "KELLOGG & CO. SAN FRANCISCO CALIFORNIA" and the denomination "TWENTY D." Albert Kuner, a skilled San Francisco die engraver, cut the dies for Kellogg's coins. This copper die trial tested the dies before gold production, allowing Kellogg and Kuner to verify that the intricate design would strike up properly across the full diameter of this large coin. The Kellogg double eagle was produced in both 1854 and 1855, and examples in gold are among the most recognizable and collected California Gold Rush coins. Copper die trials from the firm are far rarer than the gold production coins, as they served a purely utilitarian purpose and were not preserved in significant numbers.

Rarity Notes

Extremely rare. Copper die trials of the Kellogg $20 are known in only a small number of specimens, far scarcer than the gold production coins that are themselves territorial highlights.

Cross References

Kellogg & Co.; Albert Kuner (die engraver); California Gold Rush territorial coinage