1944 Threepence Bag from the San Francisco branch of the US Mint
While the world has been glued to the Olympic Games a bargain has slipped under the radar but been bought for a song by a lucky friend of the Blog. Purchased on eBay for what we believe to be only one tenth of it's true worth this Mint bag that once contained 16,000 threepences is one of only two known pre-decimal coin bags of foreign origins.
The cloth money bag is from the San Francisco branch of the U.S Mint where they struck Australian threepences in 1944 before being shipped to Australia. It is a rare numismatic collectable because it is stamped with it's origin and contents. Bags containing pre-decimal coins minted in Australia simply read "Commonwealth of Australia".
With 32,000,000 threepences minted in San Francisco in 1944 and the bag containing 16,000 threepenny bits it's likely that 2,000 bags originally existed. We've not ever seen another of these bags so they are indeed rare and scarce with not many surviving today. A shilling bag of the same era from a U.S Mint is believed to be in a collectors hands, only the second bag known. Truly a cool piece of numsmatic ephemera for a keen threepence collector.
1944 Threepence Bag from the San Francisco branch of the US Mint
Posted by harrisk at August 12, 2012 5:40 PM
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