The Coinage Act of 1792 named the dime, spelled disme, as one tenth of a dollar. A small number of dismes were struck in 1792, some of them in copper, and they are regarded as patterns. The Mint began its silver coinage in 1794, but it did not turn to the dime until 1796. NGC dates the first delivery of dimes to January 18, 1796.
The first dimes carried the Draped Bust Liberty and small eagle that had appeared on the dollar in 1795. Robert Scot cut the dies, assisted by John Eckstein. The portrait is traditionally credited to a drawing by Gilbert Stuart of the Philadelphia hostess Ann Willing Bingham, though CoinWeek notes that no such drawing has been found and that recent research doubts Stuart's part. Since the law required a value only on the cent and half cent, the dime carried no denomination.
The 1796 dimes have 15 stars. After Tennessee joined the Union, the first 1797 dimes were struck from a 16-star obverse, and the rest from one with 13 stars, the number the Mint kept from then on. In 1798 Scot's Heraldic Eagle, based on the Great Seal, replaced the small eagle. Because the dime and the gold quarter eagle were nearly the same size, the Mint used reverse dies interchangeably between them, which is why some dimes show 16 or 14 stars above the eagle instead of 13.
No dimes are dated 1799 or 1806, and none were struck in 1808. The Capped Bust dime by John Reich replaced the Draped Bust in 1809.
