Chinese Students Freedom Dollar

November 2024

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Anti-Communist Student Freedom Dollar. The following is the text quoted in the eBay sale of this type of c/s fundraising piece. This 1907 French Indo-China 5 Piastre does not appear to have any chopmarks, the other two examples in the Moneta Museum do.
Obverse is in Chinese with presumably the same legend as the
English reverse: 'CHINA FREEDOM DOLLAR - SUPPORT THE FEDERATION - SAVE THE STUDENTS'
"After the Tian An Men Square massacre [1989] in Beijing an organization [B.C.S.S.A.; Berkeley Chinese Students and Scholars Association] was formed to assist Chinese exchange students who were stranded in the United States where they had been studying. One of the devices they used to raise money was to counterstamp a few hundred old Chinese Silver Dollars and other silver dollars that circulated in mainland China at the same time as the Chinese silver dragon dollars and sell them at a premium. The silver dollars that circulated in China as the dragon dollars were mostly U.S. trade dollars, British trade dollars, French Indo-China silver piastres, and Mexican 8 reales. These foreign coins that were accepted in China as good silver trade coinage were not as many as the dragon dollars so they are actually rarer. In the center of the counterstamp was an anti-Communist logo and circling that the name of the group. On one side of the coin the lettering was in Chinese and on the other side of the coin the lettering was in English. With only about 200 of these silver coins in existence, these are extremely rare, historically very interesting and it would be very difficult to find one of these coins today. The host coins used for these Anti-communist Student Freedom Dollars appear to be limited to British Trade dollars, French Indo-China Piastres, and Mexican Cap & Ray Pesos.