Democratic Sentinel, Volume 8, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 March 1884 — The First Copper Cents. [ARTICLE]

The First Copper Cents.

The earliest American copper coins made by any State were made at Rupert, in Vermont, and before Vermont had been admitted into the Union. A mint was there established for eight or ten years, having a capacity to stamp sixty coppers, upon which the so-called “baby-head” goddess of liberty appeared ; but truth compels me to say that this goddess was no more comely than that on the coins of the present day, although she was 100 years younger. The owner of the mint, Reuben Harmon, was bound to pay the state 2j per cent for his privilege. At first these coins passed two for a penny, then four, and then eight, when they no longer paid for the cost, mainly on account of the sudden competition of other States, and of the large importations of Birmingham hardware, commonly called “Bungtown coppers.” We had no protective tariff then, and we have none now, against “Bungtowns,” whether of copper or silver. In 1787, by authority of Congress, a contract was made with James Jarvis for 300 tons of copper coin, of the Federal standard, and cents were coined at the New (laven mint of the following description: On one side thirteen circles linked together, a small circle in the middle, with the words, “We are one;” on the other side a sun-dial, and below the dial the words, “Mind ycur business.”

In 1792 Congress authorized the coinage of a copper cent weighing 264 grains, which was reduced in 1793 to 208 grains, again reduced in 1796 to 168 grains, later to 140 grains, on which the so-called “booby-head” appears, and in 1857 to 72 grains, of which 88 per cent, was to be copper and 12 per cent, nickel. In 1864 it was once more reduced to 48 grains—9s per cent, of copper and 5 per cent, of tin or zinc. Finally, in 1882, the last change was made to three-fourths of copper and one-fourth of nickel, but the weight remains at 48 grains. The frequent and wide alterations which have been made in our copper coins shpw that intrinsic value has almost vanished, and they bear no proportional value to other coins; but at the start, when copper bore a much higher price, the weight of the cent was fixed at five and a half times what it is now. In the southern portion of our country, and especially on the Pacific coast, copper coins have been as uncurrent as the yellow-haired Chinaman, or for a long time they were practically tabooed, and even now they are unwelcome travelers, much in need of a passport. Wherever not altogether snubbed the copper c ?nt must pass, as Wood’s notable copper coins must have passed in America or Ireland, far above any real value, and with little other merit beyond the dusky color now supplied on its face to our recent Indian image “Liberty.” After common use these coins assume a deeper Ethiopic complexion, and become petty nuisances, scents as well as cents, redolent of many coppery smells, which are easily translated to other coins, or to anything with which they hold pocket intercourse. Copper as a metal is wondrously useful, daily becoming more so, but neither Lycurgus nor Hamilton would at this day think of stamping it as money. Certainly we can do better. If the cent and 2 cent coins were now made wholly of nickel the Government would obtain an ample seigniorage; and the nickel, when compared with swarthy copper, is immaculate, or clean and bright. The importance of the cent coinage will be realized when we find that over 40,000,000 pieces were coined the past year.