I'm faintly familiar with the Mormon gold coins that were minted in Salt Lake City, Utah from about 1849-1860. However, I am unaware of any Mormon silver or base metal coins. Did the Mormons mint anything in either silver or base metal? Also, did the Mormons mint any coinage prior to their arrival in the Salt Lake Valley in 1847? It wouldn't surprise me if it came to light that they minted a few coins during their Nauvoo, Illinois period. I'm guessing that it would be less likely that they minted any coins earlier than that - such as when they were headquartered in Kirtland, Ohio.
I lived in Salt Lake for 28 years and I never heard of any silver coins, or any coins being minted by them elsewhere.
That's what I suspected. However, since I love chasing down obscure silver coins, I thought I'd double-check. Thanks!
The last Mormon gold coin would have been struck in 1861. Also, from what I understand, all Mormon gold coins produced in 1850 & 1851 had some level of silver in them. I doubt they would have had enough material necessary to strike coins while in Illinois. The Utah LDS church was poor and outlawed in most areas at the start. The 1849 (and later) coins came from California gold.
I am unaware of any silver or base metal Morman coins. They would have been unlikely to have struck any coins before they moved to Utah because before they they would have been in areas where the anti-counterfeiting laws were more strongly applied (States). These didn't really hold in the unincorperated western territories. Now on the other hand they DID form banks and issued paper currency while they were still back east.
I've only seen gold Mormon coinage. Which is odd considering their heartland was in the middle of the largest silver and copper mining region in the country, then as in today. Guy
There was the ill-fated Kirtland Safety Society, a bank organized by leaders of the Mormon church in 1837, and it issued some notes. But the enterprise didn't last even a year. In fact, it was a complete disaster. A lot of bankrupted Mormons left the church, and Joseph Smith was sued for running an illegal bank. I understand the notes are extremely scarce, but I don't collect bank notes and know little about them, other than they were printed on only one side.
There were notes issued in Great Salt Lake beginning in 1849 for the ZCMI(Zion's Cooperative Merchants Institution) or it's derivatives thereof. The remainders of the typeset 1849 notes are fairly common by LDS issued notes standards. The 1868 notes from the Great Salt Lake Corporation are much scarcer, especially in collectable grades. Then you get to the 1898 Bishop's Storehouse notes, most of which are seen cancelled as remainders and they are fairly common.
I'm not aware of any early Mormon silver coins. However they did produce a verity of notes and note like paper currency. Kind of an interesting history and if you like unique they can be cool to collect however you can spend a lot for some of the stuff. I auther named Rust made a book on Mormon Coinage and Currency if you are interested.
Mormon gold can only go up- they are basically church relics for the fastest growing church in the world
I lived there in 1981. Of course, I was only 10 and coins weren't an interest for me at that time. I remember when Donnie and Marie Osmond held a concert there and flew into the concert in a helicopter. They flew over our house.
If you take a look at Heritage, there are a number of copper and lead uniface restrikes of the gold pieces from 1898. However, I don't see any done in silver.
