About

Carson City Mint

 
 

 Picture of U.S. Mint at Carson City
​" ​Most of its coins are scarce to rare, some of them being tremendous rarities...All of these coins, whatever their rarity or market value, carry romantic associations with the Old West and the great bonanza years of the late 19th century... [They] never fail to stir visions of grizzled prospectors, callous gunslingers and instant millionaires. The era in which the Carson City Mint produced coins is perhaps the most fabled in American history.”
 

HISTORY AND SIGNIFICANCE

Before a branch mint was founded at Carson City silver and gold ore mined in the Nevada territory was shipped to San Francisco for processing at that city’s mint. Mine owners had to contend with bandits and the cost of shipping through the Sierra Nevada Mountains. In 1862 they began petitioning Secretary of Treasury Salmon P. Chase and Congress for a mint in Nevada. By 1866 the architectural plans, drawn up under Supervising Architect Alfred B. Mullett, finally arrived in town and construction began. Although $150,000 had been appropriated for the project, the higher costs in the western United States slowed construction until more money became available.
​
Picture of Carson Street in front of the Nevada State Capitol Click to enlarge photograph of Second and Carson Streets, in front of the Nevada State Capitol. (HABS/HAER, Library of Congress)​
Mullett wrote in his Annual Report of 1868 that “the superintendent [of construction] has acted with strict integrity as regards his expenditures, though, from the anxiety he shared in common with the citizens of Nevada to secure the erection of the building, he led the department to believe that it could be erected for a much less sum than has been found necessary, work having been once suspended, and only resumed on his promise to complete the building within the amount of the original estimate.” Nonetheless, Mullett said the building was “a handsome and convenient structure . . . and will be, excepting the one at New Orleans, the most convenient branch mint in the country.” 
 
Picture of King Street, Carson City
 
One author writes, “A frequent victim of politics, the Carson City Mint was subject to periodic budget cuts and threats of closure. It also seemed that every congressman wanted a mint in his own district, and the high cost of minting coins in Nevada was cited as grounds for closing it and opening a new mint close to some population center.” With each new presidential administration, staff changed at the mint, and productivity varied from year to year. Operations as a mint ceased in 1899, when it was reduced to an assay office until its closure in 1933. In 1941, the building was salvaged for the Nevada State Museum.
 

PRESERVATION

The Historic American Buildings Survey report of 1972 states that “in spite of a current usage far different from its original, the building is largely in original condition.” The building’s transformation into the Nevada State Museum was relatively benign toward the building’s structure and form, considering that the major renovations occurred in 1941 before many standards existed for the care of historical buildings. The exterior was maintained intact, and interior features such as vaults, the granite stairs, and most ornament were preserved. A new exhibit hall was added to the rear, behind the Annex.

 

Picture of the utilitarian Mint Annex
Click to enlarge photograph of the utilitarian Mint Annex (above), erected in two stages between 1878 and 1881 to house the boiler room, carpentry shop, storerooms, and refinery. In 1971 the Annex was taken down and replaced by the unsympathetic structure below which still stands today and houses exhibit and office spaces for the Nevada State Museum.(HABS/HAER, Library of Congress)

 

 
Picture of the Mint Annex

 

Click to enlarge photograph of the Mint Annex, which still stands today and houses exhibit and office spaces for the Nevada State Museum. (HABS/HAER, Library of Congress)
 

The building was retrofitted to withstand earthquakes, but remains in good condition close to its original state. The museum has capitalized on the building’s original function by maintaining many of the mint’s machines, such as dies, and samples of its coins. The basement holds the museum’s most popular exhibit, a recreation of a Nevada mine, which, as one author notes, were “the very lifeblood of this region during its most fabled days.” The success of preservation in this case is due, then, in large part to the museum’s concept of reuse, which uses the building itself to interpret and present the history of the region and the state of Nevada. In this way, only minor physical changes to the building were needed to accomplish new objectives while retaining a sense of the past.

 < Back
Bookmark and Share
Last Updated: 8/13/2014 4:58 PM