The History & Wonder Around the 1933 $20 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle

In the rarefied world of high-value numismatics, there's one coin that's more coveted than any other.

This is, of course, the 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle—America's most notorious coin. Minted as it was in the midst of the Great Depression, the coin was never legally issued. The bulk of them were melted down and pressed into gold bars.

Only twenty-two of the coins survived this destruction, and two of these are in the United States Numismatic Collection. The other twenty were stolen from the US Mint. The Secret Service recovered nineteen, and only one has been monetized and can be legally owned.

That's the long and the short of it. The 1933 $20 Saint-Gaudens double eagle gold coin is the rarest and the most expensive coin in the world. Every time it comes up for auction (twice in the past twenty years) it breaks world records.

But there's a lot more to the story. There's a little bit of everything in the history of the 1933 double eagle.

The story begins with Teddy Roosevelt and a famed sculptor. It continues through the other Roosevelt and a country in the throes of the Depression, then winds its way through Egyptian intrigue. Finally, it ends—where most things do—in New York City.

It involves a jealous mint worker, a shifty Philadelphia jeweler, Secret Service agents, and even a doomed king. Best of all, it's a fitting conclusion to the story of what many consider to be the most beautiful coin in the world.

So, without further ado, here's a look at the history and wonder of the infamous 1933 gold double eagle.

The History of America's Most Beautiful Coin

The history of this remarkable coin begins almost three decades earlier—in late 1904, during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt.

In the early 1900s, there was a widespread belief that the twentieth century would be an American Century. The country had survived a bloody civil war within living memory. Only six years had elapsed since the United States had defeated Spain. The war had ended with America annexing many of the Old World empire's last remaining colonial possessions.

The vigorous and irrepressible Theodore Roosevelt embodied the young nation's yearning for status and respect on the world stage. One way to achieve this was to redesign the country's coinage, which the president deemed unbefitting a great nation.

In December of 1904, President Roosevelt wrote to Leslie Mortimer Shaw, the Secretary of the Treasury:

"I think the state of our coinage is artistically of atrocious hideousness. Would it be possible…to employ a man like Saint-Gaudens to give us a coinage which would have some beauty? After all, this is the United States, we should have coinage that we’re proud of."

Augustus Saint-Gaudens, in addition to being one of the country's preeminent sculptors, was a personal friend of the president. As it turned out, the great artist also had a somewhat acrimonious history with the United States Mint.

Augustus Saint-Gaudens

Saint-Gaudens was born in Dublin, Ireland, but raised in New York City, where he studied at the National Academy of Arts. Later, he traveled to Europe, honing his art in Paris and Rome.

After returning to America, Augustus Saint-Gaudens quickly rose to become one of the chief sculptors of the Beaux Arts Renaissance. He won commission after commission, and many of his most famous sculptures are still standing today as well-known and beloved monuments.

Among Saint-Gaudens' most celebrated sculptures are the William Tecumseh Sherman equestrian statue in Central Park, the Robert Gould Shaw Memorial on Boston Common, Abraham Lincoln: The Man in Lincoln Park, and The Puritan in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Saint-Gaudens had a lifelong interest in coinage and relief work for medallions. This also brought him to his first, ill-fated association with the US Mint. In 1893, he was asked to design the official medal for the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

Saint-Gaudens' design was, as usual, a tremendous work of art. The obverse, depicting Columbus coming ashore, was singled out for praise. But the medallion's reverse was attacked as "obscene" for its depiction of a naked youth bearing a torch and laurel wreaths. This was, after all, the tail end of the Victorian Period.

They struck the medal, swapping Saint-Gaudens' reverse design with another, inferior design by the US Mint Engraver Charles E. Barber. Saint-Gaudens was furious, and refused to have anything more to do with the US Mint.

"As Artistic As the Greeks Could Desire"

But a decade later, at the urging of his friend and president, Augustus Saint-Gaudens revised his attitude toward the US Mint. He decided to accept the commission to redesign some of the US coinage.

As it turned out, it needed Congressional approval to change most monetary denominations. But President Roosevelt, impatient and full of energy, had no interest in the kind of protracted politicking required to make that happen. There were, however, a few denominations that required no such approval to change. These were the cent and the four gold coins (the $2.50 quarter eagle, the $5 half eagle, the $10 eagle, and the $20 double eagle.

Saint-Gaudens went to work designing a coinage that wasn't characterized by "atrocious hideousness." Roosevelt wanted coins that were "as artistic as the Greeks could desire." In particular, he cited the high-relief gold staters of the Greek kingdoms of Alexander's time.

A confirmed Classicist, Saint-Gaudens was enthusiastic about matching and even surpassing the numismatic artistry of the ancient Greeks. However, his designs for the gold double eagle were intended for a high-relief coinage. And this ruffled more than a few feathers at the US Mint, including the sculptor's old rival Charles Barber.

The Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle

By early 1907, Saint-Gaudens' final designs for the double eagle were ready for striking.

The obverse of the new coin depicts a female Liberty, with the US Capitol and the sun's rays behind her. The reverse shows a flying eagle, the national symbol and the coin's namesake, above a rising sun.

Altogether, the Saint-Gaudens double eagle is a beautiful work of artistry. It is truly one of the most magnificent pieces of coinage in the history of the world.

The US Mint experimented with striking the ultra-high-relief double eagles. But doing so proved difficult. Even using a medal press, it took nine strokes of the press, at maximum pressure, to produce the coin's design in full relief.

An interesting aspect of these experimental proofs is their raised rims. This was a necessary feature so the coins could be neatly stacked in treasury vaults (which is where most of these coins would end up anyway). Along the high edges—unique in US coinage—is the legend "E Pluribus Unum."

The Mint struck only about twenty of these 1907 double eagle proofs. They resurface every now and again at a high-priced auction. Aside from their rarity, they are the most beautiful of the Saint-Gaudens double eagles, capturing in high relief the full artistic vision of the great sculptor.

In 2005, a 1907 Saint-Gaudens gold double eagle proof was sold for the staggering price of $2.99 million.

The Story of the 1933 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle

Finally, after all the designs and redesigns, the new gold double eagle went into production.

From 1907 to 1908, the Mint coined more than 12,000 high-relief Saint-Gaudens double eagles. President Roosevelt expressed his satisfaction with the results, writing that "it is the best coin that has been struck for two thousand years, and…it will serve as a model for future coin makers." As in so many things, the President happened to be right about this.

Unfortunately, the beautiful high-relief coins proved too impractical for mass production by the US Mint. After all, nine strokes from a medal press to adequately mint a single coin wasn't exactly conducive to rapid production.

To solve this problem, Charles Barber (whose lot in life, it seemed, was to always modify Saint-Gaudens' work) significantly lowered the coin's relief. By the end of December, the new low-relief coins were released into circulation. These are the coins that have garnered the respect and admiration of numismatists the world over.

For the next quarter-century, the Saint-Gaudens double eagles were in more or less continuous production. There was a brief hiatus during the First World War, due to the rising prices of gold bullion. Production resumed in earnest during the Roaring Twenties. This is when the US Mint produced the highest numbers of Saint-Gaudens double eagles.

Few private citizens used the coin in the United States. It was now mostly a currency for international trade, or held in bank vaults to back gold certificates. In Europe, as a result of collapsing national currencies in the wake of the war, many preferred to use American double eagles.

Even after the Stock Market Crash of 1929, the US Government continued producing double eagles into the early years of the Great Depression. But this would all change in 1933.

The End of an Era

It's ironic that the Saint-Gaudens gold double eagle was created at the behest of one Roosevelt, and discontinued on the orders of another.

In 1933, the United States was deep in the Great Depression, and the new administration of President Franklin Roosevelt faced the challenge of salvaging the country's flagging economy. There were a few good options, but one was to halt the private circulation of gold coinage.

In the early months of 1933, the US Mint produced almost half a million Saint-Gaudens double eagles. But in April of that year, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 6102, which forbade "the hoarding of gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates within the continental United States."

By the terms of the order, all American citizens were required to surrender any gold coins they might have in their possession—with the exception of certain collector's coins. The 1933 double eagles had never entered circulation, so every one of the 445,500 coins was slated to be melted down.

Only two coins were spared the general massacre, and both of them were entrusted to the US National Numismatic Collection. And that should have been the end of the story.

A Thief in the Mint

Fortunately, for a few very lucky and wealthy collectors, that wasn't the end of the story.

A crafty cashier at the US Mint—perhaps with an eye to the value such rare coins might one day command—pilfered a number of 1933 double eagles. Officials have recovered twenty of these coins so far, but no one knows whether that's all of them.

What's most remarkable is that the theft went undiscovered for over ten years. During that time, collectors traded the coins among themselves, until the Secret Service finally caught wind of it. And as we all remember from civics classes, the Secret Service's original remit was to prevent counterfeiting and investigate financial crimes.

This time, however, the Secret Service was a little behind the curve. In fact, it only learned of the theft when a reporter contacted the US Mint about some interesting coins that were appearing in an upcoming auction.

This was in March of 1944, and during the ensuing year the Secret Service managed to track down eight of the stolen coins (a ninth was recovered in 1952). The Mint melted them all down per Roosevelt's executive order as well as the Gold Reserve Act of 1934.

The Farouk Factor

Everything was proceeding smoothly. The Secret Service could well congratulate itself for having recovered most (or so it believed) of the stolen coins.

There was only one last known coin to recover—and that's where things get interesting. This one would be a thorn in the side of the Secret Service for some time, and it has since become the most expensive coin ever sold. It's the King Farouk 1933 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle.

King Farouk I of Egypt was a notorious collector. He collected not only coins, but many other things as well: stamps, Fabergé eggs, and even aspirin bottles. But his rarest and most prized acquisition was the only 1933 double eagle to make it out of the country.

In what is probably the strangest twist in the whole strange story, King Farouk acquired the coin from a Texas dealer only a few days before the Secret Service learned of the theft of the golden eagles.

There was nothing illegal about it. The king's agents applied for and were granted an export license. The coin left the country for Egypt on February 29, 1944—and it didn't return for over fifty years. Although the Treasury Department petitioned the Egyptian government for the coin's return, history seemed to have other ideas.

For one thing, the world was embroiled in the Second World War. But once that whole misunderstanding was cleared up, the US renewed its petition to the Egyptian government, expecting the coin's swift return.

Unfortunately, in 1952 King Farouk was dethroned in a coup. Afterwards, his extensive collection, including the golden eagle, was put up for auction. Still, this didn't have to be a total disaster: the Treasury Department again requested the coin's return, and the Egyptians complied.

That's when, under circumstances that remain mysterious to this day, the coin disappeared for over forty years.

The Most Expensive Coin Ever Sold

Every good crime story needs a "MacGuffin"—some coveted object to keep the plot moving. In The Maltese Falcon it was the eponymous statue; in Kiss Me Deadly it was the nuclear whatsit in the briefcase.

The MacGuffin in this crime caper is the King Farouk golden eagle. And like a bad penny, it just keeps turning up.

In 1996, the coin reappeared when the Secret Service busted Stephen Fenton, a British coin dealer, in a sting at the Waldorf Astoria in New York. Fenton claimed innocence and stated that he had acquired the coin in a legal manner. The charges against him were later dropped, and he asserted his ownership of the coin in court.

By 2001, everything was hashed out. It was agreed that Fenton and the US Government would split the proceeds from the coin's sale.

To make it all nice and legal, the Treasury Department issued a one-time document to "monetize" the coin. In other words, it is the only 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle that is legal tender—and therefore legal for a private party to own.

In 2002, the coin sold at auction for the then-record amount of $7.6 million, including a 15% buyer's premium and a $20 fee to monetize the coin's face value. The buyer turned out to be Stuart Weitzman, a wealthy shoe designer and collector of rare coins, though his identity was kept secret for nearly twenty years.

Just last year, in June of 2021, the coin sold again. It fetched another historic price: $18,872,250, making it the most expensive coin ever sold.

The Rest of the Cache

With the sale of the only legal tender Saint-Gaudens double eagle in 2002, it seemed that all of the stolen coins were accounted for.

The Treasury Department could now rest easy, knowing that it had fulfilled FDR's executive order to the letter.

But no such luck.

In 2004, the saga of the 1933 double eagles took another, unexpected twist. Ten of these coins were discovered in the possession of the descendants of Israel Switt, a Philadelphia jeweler who fenced the other ten coins back in the '30s.

Switt's descendant, Joan Switt Langbord, surrendered the cache to the Secret Service. The coins were authenticated by the US Mint and the Smithsonian Institution; they were indeed the genuine article.

So it turned out that Israel Switt had been much busier than anyone suspected. When he copped to fencing the first ten coins in 1944, he forgot to mention the other ten which he still had in his possession.

What followed was some serious legal wrangling that occupied the better part of a decade. The US Government confiscated the newfound ten gold coins, claiming that they were its property, as the double eagles were never legally issued. The Switt family sued for their return, using the dubious claim that it was possible Israel Switt could have legally acquired them.

After a jury trial in 2011, the jurors disagreed, and the government's ownership of the coins was affirmed. The verdict was appealed, eventually making its way to the Supreme Court, which denied the appeal and closed the case once and for all.

It's no wonder that the Switt family fought so hard to retain the coins—they were estimated to be worth $80 million.

The Only Graded 1933 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle

Finally, we should make a note on the grading of the 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle.

Since there is only one of these coins that is legal tender, only one of them has ever been graded. This is, of course, the King Farouk coin, and it was graded and encapsulated by the Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS) for Sotheby's prior to its record-breaking sale in 2021.

PCGS awarded a grade of MS-65 to the gold double eagle, which stands for "Mint Grade-65." All in all, it's a pretty exceptional grade, indicating attractive luster and a sharp, crisp strike that brings out all the important details.

Start Collecting Today

The story of the 1933 Saint-Gaudens double eagle is one of the strangest and most fascinating in numismatic history.

Obviously, you can forget about obtaining the only legal coin of this issue anytime soon. But the US Mint produced the Saint-Gaudens double eagle for a quarter-century, and some of these coins from more prolific years are still obtainable—given enough time and resources.

And even if these coins are out of your league, there are still plenty of other coins to collect, from classic American issues to ancient coins of Greece and Rome.