USA St. Gaudens $20 Double Eagle - 1908 No Motto

November 2024

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Augustus Saint Gaudens designed this for the mint when Theodore Roosevelt wanted to catch up with the Art Nouveau period of design. It's the affordable 1908 issue with NO MOTTO (In God We Trust).To me, all the coins of this short era are the very best of any. The Italian and the French coins are also exceptional for this period. I have a lot to write about on these. But for now I'd like to call attention to the original design St. Gaudens had in mind when he designed this 20 Dollar Double Eagle. For that you need to visit this Moneta Museum under Africa - Liberia - USA Tribute Coins. There you can see that St Gaudens wanted to put a feathered head dress on Lady Liberty. His design also included a beautiful set of wings very reminiscent of ancient Greek and Roman depictions of Victory.
Naturally, since this is one of the most beautiful coins of the USA or anywhere, you'd want one of the High Relief Double Eagles of 1907. The best I could do was obtain the special high relief restrike bullion coin of the USA. That incredible and technologically intense coin can also be seen here in the Museum.
Hettie Anderson is the known model for the $20 gold piece of 1907> and the Walking Liberty half dollar, she was born in South Carolina in 1873. She relocated to New York City, where she became an artist's model, an uncommon employment at that time for a woman of African-American descent. Anderson posed for the Sherman Monument's figure of Victory in 1897; one of her sittings with Saint-Gaudens was captured by the artist Anders Zorn. Anderson was also the model for the figure of Liberty on Saint-Gaudens' twenty-dollar gold piece.
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