1860 Clark, Gruber & Co. Two-and-a-Half Dollar Die Trial - Copper

Coin Details

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Description

This is a copper striking from the dies of the 1860 Clark, Gruber & Co. two-and-a-half-dollar piece. Austin M. Clark, Milton E. Clark and Emanuel H. Gruber ran a brokerage firm in Leavenworth, Kansas, and opened an office in Denver during the Pikes Peak gold rush. To save the cost of shipping gold dust east they opened a mint in a two-story brick building at Market and 16th Streets on July 25, 1860, first striking ten-dollar pieces showing a mountain with PIKES PEAK GOLD and DENVER, and soon twenty-, five- and two-and-a-half-dollar pieces. Over almost three years they coined $594,305 in gold, and in April 1863 the Treasury bought the building, which became a United States Assay Office. It is a die trial, struck from Clark, Gruber & Co. dies in a base metal, not one of the gold coins. PCGS number 10143.