During the formative years of America, principally in the mid-1800s, government could not provide an adequate supply of money to the rapidly expanding nation. America’s capitalistic economy brought about free market driven growth in industry and prosperity that fueled both the need for, and the satisfaction of, a complementary means of exchange and a store of capital. What naturally developed by American ingenuity were private issues, such as gold rush territorial coins, remote assayer privately-struck coinage, monetary designated assayer ingots and pioneer tokens. The most prolific and well known names in the privately issued money segment of the market were Augustus Humbert, John Grover Kellogg and John Little Moffat. The private issue money segment of the numismatic market is certainly most intriguing, offering a unique means of studying and enjoining history through circulating coinage and other early forms of money.
