American Silver Eagle – Anatomy 101

By Tim MacKenzie

Get ready for ‘Anatomy 101′ of the American Silver Eagle coin – a condensed description of all of the parts of each of the coins in the program.

Body Parts

‘Heads or ‘Tails’. You guessed it – the American Silver Eagle is no exception – it has one of each as usual – an ‘obverse’ side or the ‘head’ so to speak, and the ‘reverse’ side or the ‘tail’. I guess that you could say that there is a third side too, the ‘edge’, but not very likely to come up in a flip of the Eagle. Each of the sides has an outside rim to protect the impressed inner designs from wear. The edge is ‘reeded’ with vertical ridges around the circumference that help with gripping the coin. Oh yes, I almost forgot – the coin is round.

Of course, not all coins are round and have rims and reeded edges. Rims are pretty standard now, multi-sided coins are rare, and edges are varied in style – they can be just plain, more decorative, or even lettered with the face value, date or some other identifying mark – on some coins edge patterns are used to assist the blind in identifying their denomination.

On either side of the Silver Eagle and inside the rim is where the real content lies – areas of unique and engraved design, a ‘legend’ or principal lettering, a mint mark, and other textual inscriptions – all in relief or raised above the flat surface background which is called the ‘field’ of the coin.

Facial Features

The orientation of content from the obverse to the reverse side of the coin is not something that most people are aware of. It can be a ‘coin orientation’ – as it is for the American Silver Eagle and all other American coins – or a ‘medallic orientation’ – as it is for Australian coins. ‘Coin orientation’ means that you see both sides upright when flipping horizontally. ‘Medallic orientation’ means that you see both sides upright when flipping vertically.

On the American Silver Eagle’s obverse side is the principal design – Adolph Weinman’s ‘Walking Liberty’. This is a revived version of his original ‘Walking Liberty Half Dollar’ design, minted prior to 1946. It has been described as:

“a full length Liberty, the fold of the stars and stripes flying to the breeze as a background, progressing in full stride toward the dawn of a new day, carrying branches of laurel and oak symbolic of civil and military glory. The hand of the figure is outstretched in bestowal of the spirit of liberty.”

Also on the obverse side of the Silver Eagle is the legend, “LIBERTY”, stretched across the top half circumference in large letters. In much smaller letters located in the southeast outer area is the inscription, “IN GOD WE TRUST”. The mint date is inscribed in the center of the bottom circumference.

On the American Silver Eagle’s reverse side is an original relief design by John Mercanti. It is composed of an heraldic eagle behind a shield that signifies American strength. The eagle is holding an olive branch and arrows in its talons. Located above the eagle is a triangular arrangement of thirteen five-pointed stars representing the “Thirteen Colonies”.

Also on the reverse side is inscribed “.UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.” on the upper half circumference and “1 OZ. FINE SILVER~ONE DOLLAR” on the lower half circumference. The words “E PLURIBUS UNUM” appear, as they do by law now on all American coins, in scrolls around the wings of the eagle. Finally, a mint mark is inscribed lower down below the eagle’s right wing (on the left side as we see it). Note, however, that there are no mint marks on bullion silver eagles. Proof and uncirculated (burnished) versions have an ‘S’ for the San Francisco Mint, a ‘P’ for the Philadelphia Mint or a ‘W’ for the West Point Mint, depending upon which mint produced the coin.

Different Species

American Silver Eagles are similar but really not all the same – the mint mark or its absence as noted above is one obvious distinction among them, the mint date is obviously another. There is also a quality distinction in the mint version that is due to the different minting processes used for bullion, proof and uncirculated (burnished) coins.

The bullion, the highest production version (about 8.3 million per year on average until 2009), is automatically pressed from standard silver planchets using a single strike – it is less striking in appearance (pardon the pun) than the other versions.

Uncirculated Silver Eagles are created from blanks that have been burnished by tumbling them in a wash of stainless steel shot, resulting in a more polished and satin-like finish. The “W” mint mark is also inscribed on these coins reflecting their striking at the United States Mint at West Point.

Finally, the proof versions undergo a specialized minting process in which burnished planchets are manually fed into presses fitted with special dies that strike multiple times, creating a magnificent appearance of detailed images floating above a mirrored background.

Minor Mutations

There is an unintentional variety or error that was generated when the United States Mint made minor alterations to the 2007 reverse design for 2008 and erroneously used the original 2007 reverse die in a small part of the 2008 production.

Special Issues of the American Silver Eagle over the years have created some other exceptions in their appearance. One example is the inclusion of a special West Point minted proof Silver Eagle coin with a ‘W’ mint mark in the 1995 ’10th Anniversary American Eagle Five Coin Set”. In 1995, regular proof Silver Eagles were minted at the Philadelphia facility and inscribed with a ‘P’ mint mark. Another striking example (sorry for the pun again) is the ‘Reverse Proof Silver Eagle’ coin minted at Philadelphia as part of a 3-coin set to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the American Silver Eagle program in 2006 – it features a frosted background and mirrored raised surfaces, the opposite of a typical proof coin.

Genealogy

Not all versions of the Silver Eagle were produced every year since the inception of the program in 1986 – with the exception of the bullion. However, its mint source has changed during its history from San Francisco (1986-1998) to Philadelphia and West Point (1999-2000) and to West Point only (2001 to present) – these changes are transparent, however, since bullion Silver Eagle coins bear no mint mark.

Proof Silver Eagles have been produced almost every year – the exceptions being 2009 to the present (June, 2010). Production was heavily allocated in 2008 and was suspended entirely in 2009 after the economic downturn created an unprecedented demand for bullion as a hedge against inflation. It is still not certain whether there will be any production in 2010. Production of proof Silver Eagles started at the San Francisco Mint and continued until 1992 with the inscribed ‘S’ mint mark. From 1993 until 2000, they were minted at Philadelphia and inscribed with the ‘P’ mint mark. The West Point Mint took over production with their ‘W’ mint mark in 2001-2008.

Uncirculated Silver Eagles have had a short history. They were minted with the ‘W’ mint mark at West Point from 2006-2008. Production was discontinued thereafter because of the same bullion coin priority for silver blanks as suffered by proof coins and dictated by the legal requirement to meet the unprecedented bullion demand.

Dress Up

Although packaging is not really part of the anatomy of the Silver Eagle, it does really embellish them in a fashion. Bullion coins are packaged and shipped in bulk to select authorized purchasers in appropriately labelled green plastic ‘monster boxes’ – each box contains twenty-five 20-coin plastic tubes, making 500 coins in total. These bullion coins are available to the public through distributers associated with the authorized purchasers.

Silver Eagle proof, uncirculated and special issues are all available directly from the US Mint subject to availability. The proof and uncirculated coins for the most part are packaged individually in a protective plastic capsule mounted in a satin-lined, velvet-covered presentation case and accompanied by a certificate of authenticity – the exception here was the 2006 uncirculated coin capsule which was housed in a velvet drawstring bag instead of the presentation case.

Chemistry and Stature

To complete our anatomy 101 lesson on the American Silver Eagle, there are some other important properties that should be mentioned as follows (they are the same for all variations of the Silver Eagle coin noted above):

Mass: 31.103 g (1.00 troy oz)
Diameter: 40.6 mm (1.598 in)
Thickness: 2.98 mm (0.1193 in)
Composition: 99.9% Ag and 00.1% Cu

QED – American Silver Eagle Anatomy 101

If you are interested in collecting or investing in the American Silver Eagle or just want to become more enlightened, drop by my blog at: AmericanSilverEagleCoins.org

I am very busy there building up a repository of interesting articles and references to guide you along. Enjoy the tour!

Tim MacKenzie is a Professional Engineer in Ontario, Canada. He spent many years in scientific research and building information systems. His focus now is on Internet communications.

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