Highlights

A few of the highlights in the collection are: an exampe of the earliest Washington token the 1783 Gerorgius Triumpho copper, a Born Virginia token, an example of a Washington memorial funeral token created by Jacob Perkins, a Washington Monument token of 1848 and one of a very few surviving examples of the NO GOOD token.

Navigating the Site

The main table of contents gives basic categories in chronological order. These basic categories are clickable and lead to 'section contents pages' which list specific coin types. The is also a chronological index that includes all the tokens in the site as part of a single index and another index of each item listed in Baker number order (as expanded by Rulau). The site presents a chronological presentation of the material, which can be followed by clicking the arrows at the bottom of each page. For a presentation in the standard Baker number order one needs to use the Baker index page, accessable by a button at the bottom of every page. Washington tokens without a Baker number, such as the Douglas Centennial medals and Fuld Civil War partrioic tokens, are found at the end on the Baker listing.

Each coin in the collection is cataloged with basic comments. All coins are presented in full color and have been uniformly scanned at 100% image size, therefore the proportions of the coin images are relative to each other. Exact dimensions and weight are given in each entry. A small 100 dpi (dots per square inch) image of the obverse and reverse of each coin (slightly larger that life size) is displayed with the option of bringing up a larger 250 or 500 dpi image by clicking on the appropriate number to the left of the small image. Naturally, larger images will have better details, however larger images will also take longer to load (depending on your internet connection and modem speed this could be from 7 seconds to over a minute).

The database SEARCH option, found at the bottom of each page, allows you to search the entire site for items or terms you wish to find. For example, you may search for all items with a specific legend or weight range. There search results will appear as a numbered list, each item can be clicked to bring up the corresponding web page with the seach term bolded on the page. Further details are give on the search form which can be accessed by clicking the search button at the bottom of each page.

Viewing Tips

Coin Measurements

Principles of Inclusion

We have sought to be as inclusive as possible in describing the coins, tokens and metals representing George Washington. In additioni to the items found in Baker's guide ti Washingtin tokens we have included Civil War patriotic tokens depicting Washington. Naturally, additional coins will be added to the site as the collection expands.

Basic References

Most of the information in this site is derived from Russell Rulau and George Fuld, Medallic Portraits of Washington, Centennial edition, Iola, WI; Krause, 1985. Other sources include W.S. Baker's original editon of Medallic Portraits of Washington, Philadelphia: Robert Lindsay, 1885; George Fuld, " Coinage Featuring George Washington", in Coinage of the American Confederation Period edited by Philip L. Mossman, in the American Numismatic Society's Coinage of the Americas Conference, Proceedings No. 11, from a conference held October 28, 1995, New York: ANS, 1996, pp. 165-259 (for colonial realted items). Also see, Bowers and Ruddy Gallery, The Garett Collecyion Sale: Part 4, Public Auction of March 25-26, 1981, lots 1693-1912. For storecards and patriotic tokens see: Russell Rulau, Standard Catalog of United States Tokens 1700 - 1900, 2nd edition, Iola, WI: Krause, 1997 and George and Melvin Fuld, U.S. Civil War Store Cards, 2nd ed., Lawrence, MA: Quaterman Publications, 1975. Other sources are listed under the specific entries to which they refer.

Contributions of coins, images and/or information or updates are always welcome and appropriate credit will be noted in the text.

Credits

All texts, descriptions, organization and updating of the material are the responsibility of Louis Jordan. In December of 1998 James C. Spilman and the Colonial Newsletter Foundation agreed to act as image coordinator. We hope to add images scanned from photographs or slides, of materials in other collections. Most of the images were scanned Jennifer Sullivan working under the supervision of Louis Jordan. Christian Dupont constructed the search engine and supervised the technical functions performed by our student assistants, Sean Deschene and Matthew Ring. Sean did the initial linking of pages. Matt completed the linking, designed the navigational buttons, constructed the table of contents and indexes, and measured and weighed many of the tokens.

Questions and Comments