Lot 2615
1914-S $20 St. Gaudens. PCGS graded MS-62. Nice lustrous fields, particulary on the reverse. An historic year for America and it's gold coinage, although few numismatists today are aware of it.
Panic spread after the outbreak of World War I in the summer of 1914. "When Washington Shut Down Wall Street" by William I. Silber is a book about the banking crisis that year. The history traces Treasury Secretary William Gibbs McAdoo's triumph over a monetary crisis that threatened the United States with financial disaster. "The biggest gold outflow in a generation imperiled America's ability to repay its debts abroad. Fear that the United States would abandon the gold standard sent the dollar plummeting on world markets. Without a central bank in the summer of 1914, the United States resembled a headless financial giant."
McAdoo stepped in by shutting the New York Stock Exchange for more than four months to prevent Europeans from selling their American securities and demanding gold in return. His actions allowed the as yet unopened bank branches of the Federal Reserve system time to stock their shelves with gold coins and bars. The crisis eased just as they opened at the end of the year (PCGS # 9166) .
Estimated Value $1,350 - 1,400.
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| Realized $1,351 |
