MARCH 10
1870•1870-CC Liberty Head Double Eagle ($20)
2015•Presidential $1 Proof Set
Carson City Begins Striking the 1870-CC Liberty Head Double Eagle
On March 10, 1870, the new United States Branch Mint at Carson City began producing one of the most legendary coins ever to carry the CC mintmark: the 1870-CC Liberty Head $20 double eagle. Only 3,789 were struck during the year. Most entered the hard-working economy of the American West, where twenty dollars represented a substantial sum and gold coins functioned as serious money rather than collectibles. Few survived. Today the 1870-CC is the rarest regular-issue Carson City double eagle and one of the great prizes of nineteenth-century American gold coinage.
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The Carson City Mint was barely a month into coin production.
Its presses had begun turning Nevada bullion into federal money.
Silver dollars came first.
Gold denominations followed.
Then, on March 10, the mint began striking the largest regular gold denomination in the United States.
The double eagle.
Why Build a Mint in Carson City?
The answer begins beneath the mountains of western Nevada.
In 1859, miners discovered the extraordinary silver-and-gold deposit that became known as the Comstock Lode.
The discovery transformed the region.
Mining camps became towns.
Fortunes were made and lost.
Huge quantities of precious metal needed to be refined, assayed and converted into money.
Before Carson City had a federal mint, western bullion often had to travel considerable distances for coinage.
San Francisco had operated a branch mint since 1854, but Nevada mining interests wanted a facility closer to the Comstock.
Transporting valuable bullion was expensive, inconvenient and risky.
A local mint promised to reduce those problems.
Congress authorized a branch mint in Nevada Territory in 1863.
The Civil War was still raging.
Construction and administrative delays meant the facility did not begin coining immediately.
Years passed between authorization and the first federal coins bearing the famous CC mintmark.
One of the most important figures in the mint's creation was Abraham Curry.
Curry was a businessman and civic leader often called one of the founders of Carson City.
He promoted the establishment of a federal mint and later became its first superintendent.
The building itself became one of Nevada's most important nineteenth-century federal institutions.
Coinage Finally Begins in 1870
The Carson City Mint began coin production in February 1870.
Its earliest coins included Seated Liberty silver dollars.
Gold denominations soon followed.
Every first-year Carson City issue has special historical appeal because it marks the beginning of the CC mintmark.
On March 10, 1870, Carson City began striking Liberty Head double eagles.
The denomination carried a face value of $20.
That was a large amount of money in 1870.
These were not coins designed to make small retail purchases.
They were efficient containers of high-value gold.
The traditional U.S. gold eagle had a face value of $10.
A $20 gold piece therefore became the double eagle.
Congress authorized the denomination in 1849 during the California Gold Rush.
The enormous new western gold supply created demand for a coin capable of converting bullion into money efficiently.
The double eagle had been born from one western mining boom.
Two decades later, Carson City used the same denomination amid another.
The geography had shifted from California's gold fields to the mineral wealth of Nevada.
The coin remained perfectly suited to the job.
Chief Engraver James Barton Longacre designed the Liberty Head double eagle.
The obverse features a left-facing bust of Liberty wearing a coronet inscribed LIBERTY.
Thirteen stars surround the portrait.
The date appears below.
The reverse shows a heraldic eagle with a shield.
Rays and stars rise above the eagle.
The inscriptions identify the United States and denomination.
By 1870, the reverse also included IN GOD WE TRUST, added to the double eagle design during the 1860s.
Collectors classify the 1870-CC as a Type II Liberty Head double eagle.
Type I coins, struck from 1850 through 1866, lacked IN GOD WE TRUST.
Type II, introduced in 1866, added the motto and used the denomination wording TWENTY D.
Type III followed in 1877 with further reverse changes.
The small letters CC identify Carson City.
For collectors, few American mintmarks have more personality.
CC evokes Nevada mines, western bullion, stage routes, frontier banking and one of the shortest-lived major branch mints in U.S. history.
Only 3,789 Were Struck
The Carson City Mint produced just 3,789 double eagles dated 1870.
Even by nineteenth-century gold-coin standards, that is a very small mintage.
Later Carson City double-eagle issues were produced in much larger quantities.
The first-year 1870-CC began scarce.
A mintage of 3,789 does not mean 3,789 examples still exist.
Far from it.
Gold coins were melted, exported, lost, damaged and worn.
Many nineteenth-century double eagles disappeared into bullion flows long before coin collecting became interested in Carson City by date and mintmark.
Specialist estimates generally place the surviving population of 1870-CC double eagles at only a few dozen pieces.
Exact counts are impossible because the same coin can appear in different auctions or grading-service submissions over time.
What is clear is that the issue is genuinely rare.
The 1870-CC was money.
Its surviving examples usually show substantial circulation.
High-grade pieces are exceptionally rare.
That wear is not a flaw in the historical story.
It is evidence that these coins participated in the western economy for which they were made.
In 1870, there was little reason for an ordinary person to put away a brand-new Carson City double eagle as a collectible.
Twenty dollars represented too much purchasing power to casually remove from use.
Modern collectors benefit when earlier generations saved coins.
For the 1870-CC, very few people did.
A double eagle could represent weeks of wages for many workers.
It was useful for large payments, banking transactions, bullion settlement and transfers of substantial value.
The coin's high denomination explains both its economic importance and its low likelihood of being saved as a souvenir.
Today, Carson City is especially famous for Morgan dollars.
Large quantities of CC Morgan dollars survived in Treasury vaults and later entered the collector market through General Services Administration sales.
Carson City gold had no comparable mass survival event.
The gold coins were far more likely to be used, exported or melted.
The Comstock Was Famous for Silver, but Gold Was There Too
The Comstock Lode is remembered primarily as a great silver discovery.
Its ore also contained substantial gold.
Western mining output did not fit neatly into a single-metal story.
The Carson City Mint processed both silver and gold into federal denominations.
Turning gold into $1 or $2.50 coins required many more pieces.
A $20 coin concentrated value.
For institutions handling bullion and large payments, that efficiency mattered.
The denomination was one of the workhorses of nineteenth-century international and domestic gold finance.
Early Carson City coins are not always known for pristine manufacture.
Limited equipment, die conditions and the practical demands of a new branch mint could affect striking quality.
Collectors evaluate genuine 1870-CC double eagles with those production realities in mind.
A coin's rarity and historical importance can far outweigh cosmetic perfection.
Large gold coins are soft and heavy.
When double eagles contacted one another in bags or commerce, they acquired marks.
Many surviving nineteenth-century examples show abrasions even when they did not circulate heavily.
On an 1870-CC, completely pristine surfaces would be extraordinary.
Because the issue is so rare, even impaired examples can be highly desirable.
Some survivors have been cleaned, scratched, repaired or otherwise altered.
Major grading services may authenticate such pieces while assigning details designations rather than straight numerical grades.
For a great rarity, authenticity is often the first concern.
High-value key dates attract deception.
A common Philadelphia double eagle cannot simply become an 1870-CC because someone adds letters to the reverse.
Specialists examine mintmark shape and placement, date characteristics, die markers, surfaces and other diagnostics.
Professional authentication is essential for a coin of this value.
Among the nineteen years in which Carson City struck double eagles, the 1870-CC stands at the top in rarity.
Later key dates such as 1878-CC and 1879-CC are also scarce.
But the first-year issue is the foundational prize.
Collectors pursuing every CC double eagle face a major challenge.
Even relatively available dates are expensive because each coin contains nearly an ounce of gold and carries collector demand.
Add the great rarities, and a complete set becomes an elite numismatic undertaking.
The 1870-CC Is More Than a Key Date
Key dates can sometimes feel like arbitrary holes in an album.
The 1870-CC is historically richer than that.
It is the first Carson City double eagle.
It comes from the mint's first year.
It connects directly to Nevada mining and the expansion of federal coinage in the West.
Carson City also struck $5 half eagles and $10 eagles in 1870.
Those first-year gold issues are scarce and historically important in their own right.
Together, the three denominations established Carson City's federal gold-coin production.
The mint's first coinage in February 1870 consisted of silver dollars.
That chronology is useful because it prevents a common simplification.
The March 10 double eagle was not the first coin ever struck at Carson City.
It was the beginning of $20 gold production there.
The early United States Mint was centered in Philadelphia.
As the country expanded and precious-metal discoveries occurred far from the East Coast, branch mints became practical necessities.
New Orleans served the South and Gulf trade.
Charlotte and Dahlonega served southern gold regions.
San Francisco served California.
Carson City served the mining economy of Nevada and the interior West.
Carson City did not strike coins continuously throughout its existence.
Coinage ran from 1870 through 1885, stopped, then resumed from 1889 through 1893.
After coinage ended permanently, the facility continued in other federal roles, including assay work.
The historic Carson City Mint building still stands.
It later became part of the Nevada State Museum.
Visitors can encounter the physical setting where CC coins were made.
That surviving building gives Carson City numismatics a tangible connection to place.
Carson City's historic Coin Press No. 1 has become an icon in its own right.
The press was used in the mint's nineteenth-century operations and survives today at the Nevada State Museum.
Its preservation helps explain why Carson City coinage feels unusually accessible as industrial history.
The Double Eagle and International Gold Flows
American double eagles did not remain only in the United States.
Large quantities traveled overseas in international payments and banking transactions.
European bank vaults later became sources of surviving U.S. gold coins.
For some dates, overseas holdings dramatically increased the number available to collectors.
Some nineteenth-century double eagles once considered rare became more available after overseas hoards surfaced.
The 1870-CC did not receive that kind of rescue in meaningful numbers.
Its surviving population remains tiny.
That helps explain its enduring status.
Twentieth-century changes in U.S. gold policy led to the surrender and melting of large quantities of gold coin.
But collectible and numismatic pieces could survive through exemptions, overseas holdings and private collections.
Every surviving 1870-CC therefore represents a chain of preservation through multiple eras of melting and monetary change.
Longacre's basic design remained in production from 1850 through 1907, with major reverse modifications along the way.
It eventually gave way to Augustus Saint-Gaudens' celebrated double eagle.
The Liberty Head type therefore spans the Gold Rush, Civil War, Reconstruction, western mining booms and the emergence of modern industrial America.
The year Carson City began striking double eagles was only five years after the Civil War.
The transcontinental railroad had been completed the previous year.
Western mining, railroad expansion and federal power were reshaping the nation.
The new Nevada branch mint belonged to that larger transformation.
Nevada entered the Union in 1864.
By 1870, its capital region had a functioning federal mint.
The speed of that development reflects the political and economic importance of western mineral wealth.
Precious metal could accelerate institution building.
Carson City coins were not always treated as romantic frontier relics.
That reputation grew over time.
Today the CC mintmark has extraordinary collector recognition.
Morgan dollars introduced many collectors to it, but gold specialists know the mintmark's rarer side.
The coin combines almost every trait that drives serious numismatic interest:
- first-year status
- a famous branch mint
- extremely low mintage
- tiny surviving population
- a large historic gold denomination
- strong connection to western mining
- heavy real-world circulation
Few coins combine all of those qualities at once.
Condition Census Coins
Because so few examples survive, advanced collectors and researchers track the finest known pieces individually.
A small improvement in grade can represent a major jump in rarity and market value.
Pedigrees become important.
Auction appearances can add chapters to the documented history of a specific coin.
We usually cannot know where a particular 1870-CC traveled in the 1870s.
But the wear itself suggests movement.
A coin may have passed through a bank, mining company, merchant, payroll or bullion transaction.
The lack of detailed personal provenance does not erase its economic history.
The intrinsic gold value of a double eagle is substantial.
For the 1870-CC, however, bullion value is almost irrelevant to collector valuation.
The surviving coin is valuable because of rarity, history, condition and demand.
Melting one would destroy vastly more numismatic value than the metal could provide.
That transformation is one of the fascinating things about old coins.
In 1870, the double eagle's purpose was to move twenty dollars of monetary value efficiently.
Today an 1870-CC is a historical artifact worth far beyond face value or bullion content.
Its function changed because time changed its scarcity.
March 10 is not merely another Carson City date.
It marks the beginning of the mint's production of America's highest regular gold denomination.
Only 3,789 examples would be struck that year.
Most would disappear.
The survivors became one of the defining rarities of Carson City coinage.
The phrase alone explains much of the appeal.
The first.
CC.
Double eagle.
Each element carries weight in American numismatics.
Together they produced a coin whose reputation has only grown.
On March 10, 1870, the Carson City Mint began striking Liberty Head $20 double eagles. Only 3,789 would be produced during that first year, and just a small fraction survived the hard-working gold economy of the American West. The 1870-CC became the rarest regular-issue Carson City double eagle—a coin born from Nevada's mining boom and transformed by time into one of the great treasures of United States gold coinage.
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