The $1.175 Million 1792 Birch Cent and the Mystery Washington Never Explained
The Bushnell-Parmelee-Jenks-Col. Green 1792 Birch Cent stands among the most important copper coins in American numismatics. It may also explain one of the strangest silences in George Washington’s 1792 address to Congress.
In March 2015, Stack’s Bowers Galleries sold a landmark 1792 Birch Cent for $1,175,000 at its Baltimore auction. The coin came from the Henry P. Kendall Foundation Collection.
This was not just another early copper rarity.
It was the Bushnell-Parmelee-Jenks-Col. Green specimen, that carried a PCGS grade of AU-58, and also earned CAC approval. More importantly, it represented one of the first serious attempts to create a cent for the new United States.
Today, collectors often call the Birch Cent the first American cent. That title needs context. The coin did not circulate as a regular federal issue. Instead, it belongs to the experimental coinage of 1792. Even so, it stands at the beginning of the American cent tradition.
And that makes it historic.
A Copper Coin at the Birth of the United States Mint
Congress passed the Mint Act on April 2, 1792. The law created the United States Mint and established the nation’s decimal coinage system.
The cent posed an immediate problem.
The law required each cent to contain 11 pennyweights of copper. That equals 264 grains. Therefore, a full-value copper cent would have been large, heavy, and awkward for daily use.
The offered Birch Cent weighed 207.6 grains and measured 32.5 millimeters. It used copper and carried a lettered edge with two stars. The edge reads:
**TO BE ESTEEMED * BE USEFUL **
That motto turned the edge into a civic lesson. In simple terms, the coin told citizens that public esteem should come from usefulness. It fit the language of the early republic perfectly.
The Coin Itself: AU-58, CAC, and Exceptionally Choice
This 1792 Birch Cent shows rich, lustrous light-brown color. Its surfaces remain smooth. In places, they also retain reflectivity.
The obverse fields show subtle iridescence. Pale olive and gold appear around the date. Meanwhile, the reverse shows even more reflection and cartwheel activity. Olive and gold still surround many design elements. These are the areas where original mint color would have lingered longest.
With magnification, a patient viewer can find thin, old hairlines. However, the coin avoids serious contact marks. A short, curved scratch runs down the central reverse, left of the N in ONE and through the N below in CENT. Also, a shallow curled lintmark appears beneath the I in UNITED.
The rims stand high. That comes from both the upsetting process and the bold denticles. The denticles show strongest at the top of the obverse and at the base of the reverse.
The obverse sits nearly perfectly centered. The reverse sits only slightly toward 1 o’clock. Overall sharpness remains excellent. Some softness appears on the highest parts of the portrait. Yet that softness comes largely from strike, not circulation.
As a result, the coin offers both technical quality and extraordinary eye appeal.
The State of the Union Mystery
The Birch Cent also has a remarkable political backstory.
On August 23, 1792, George Washington wrote to Thomas Jefferson from Mount Vernon. Washington asked his secretary of state to prepare material for the next address to Congress.
Jefferson answered from Monticello on September 9. His letter ran long. It included political complaints about Alexander Hamilton and factions inside Washington’s government. However, Jefferson also promised to send material for the President’s congressional message.
About a month later, Jefferson did just that.
On October 15, 1792, Jefferson drafted language about the new Mint. He wrote that the government had engaged artists from abroad and at home. He also noted that buildings for the Mint had been prepared. Then he added the crucial sentence.
Jefferson said there had been “a small beginning” in the coinage of half dismes and cents.
Washington did not deliver that sentence exactly as Jefferson wrote it.
When Alexander Hamilton incorporated the language into Washington’s message, the final address only mentioned half dismes. It omitted the cents.
That omission creates a numismatic mystery.
Did Hamilton dislike the Birch Cent? Or did Washington object to its size? Possibly some officials considerrd the number struck too small to mention? Or did the earlier G*W. Pt. Birch variety touch too close to Washington’s known discomfort with presidential references on coinage?
We do not know.
However, we do know this: Jefferson mentioned cents in October 1792, and Washington’s final message did not.
That silence gives the Birch Cent a powerful place in the nation’s first coinage story.
Why the Birch Cent Likely Came First
The 1792 Birch Cent may predate the better-known Silver Center Cent and Fusible Alloy cent experiments.
Mint Chief Coiner Henry Voigt recorded that he struck a few copper pieces on December 17, 1792. The next day, Jefferson sent Washington examples of Silver Center cents. Jefferson also wrote that Mint Director David Rittenhouse planned to make a few cents by fusing the plug with copper.
That timeline matters.
If Jefferson already mentioned cents in his October draft, then the Birch Cents provide the best candidate for those earlier pieces. The Silver Center and Fusible Alloy cents belong to mid-December activity inside the Philadelphia Mint.
The Birch Cent also shares strong stylistic links with the 1792 half dismes. Therefore, many numismatists place its creation near the late summer of 1792.
In short, the Birch Cent may have reached Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, and other cabinet members before any other American cent pattern.
It is not only rare. It may have sat at the center of the first debate over what American money should look like.
Liberty, Not a President
The 1792 Birch Cent also reflects a major design debate.
One early Senate version of the Mint legislation called for coins to carry the head of the sitting President. The House opposed that idea. The final law chose an image emblematic of Liberty instead.
That choice mattered.
The United States had rejected monarchy. Therefore, its coinage could not look like royal coinage. Liberty, not Washington, would represent the new republic.
One Birch variety shows how unsettled the issue remained. The unique white metal Judd-6 variety carries the reverse inscription G*W. Pt., which refers to George Washington, President. That design tried to bridge two ideas. It used Liberty while still acknowledging Washington.
The experiment did not continue.
The surviving copper Birch Cents dropped that presidential reference. They kept Liberty on the obverse and the denomination within a wreath on the reverse.
The Four Birch Cent Varieties
Collectors recognize four Birch Cent varieties.
Judd-3 has a plain edge. Two examples are known.
Judd-4 has the edge inscription TO BE ESTEEMED * BE USEFUL *. Seven examples are known.
Judd-5 has the edge inscription TO BE ESTEEMED BE USEFUL *. Two examples are known.
Judd-6. is the rarest in white metal Only one example survives. It carries the G*W. Pt. reverse inscription.
The weight data adds another layer to the story. Leonard Augsburger has suggested that the different edge varieties may connect to different weight standards.
The two known Judd-5 pieces weigh 262.2 grains and 240.6 grains. That may point toward the original 264-grain cent standard.
Known Judd-4 weights range from 193 grains to 220.8 grains. That may point toward a lighter 208-grain standard.
The plain-edge Judd-3 pieces appear to fall between those groups. The Jay-Park specimen has weighed in at 226 grains.
Still, the evidence remains open to study. The weight differences may reflect deliberate standards. They may also reflect the experimental nature of the 1792 pattern coinage.
The Known Judd-4 Birch Cents
The Judd-4 Birch Cent ranks among the great American pattern coins. Stack’s Bowers enumerated seven known examples of this variety.
- Garrett-Partrick specimen– NGC graded this coin MS-65★ Red and Brown. It carried CAC approval. Heritage sold it in January 2015 for $2,585,000.
- Bushnell-Parmelee-Jenks-Col. Green-Kendall specimen – This is the coin featured here. PCGS graded it AU-58, and CAC approved it. Its traceable provenance reaches back to the 1882 Bushnell sale.
- Joe Lasser specimen – This coin now resides permanently at Colonial Williamsburg. It came from Bebee’s 1955 ANA sale and grades Very Fine.
- Stack’s May 1998 specimen – This coin grades Very Fine. It may trace earlier to Dr. Alfred R. Globus.
- Norweb specimen – This coin resides permanently in the National Numismatic Collection. It was Parmelee’s duplicate and earlier came from Seavey. It grades Very Fine.
- Dr. Judd-Roper specimen – This example grades Fine.
- Perl-Harte specimen – This coin shows a Fine obverse and an About Good reverse.
Most Judd-4 Birch Cents show heavy circulation. That makes the AU-58 Kendall coin especially important.
A Choice Survivor Among Extreme Rarities
Among all copper Birch Cents, very few qualify as high grade.
The Garrett-Partrick Judd-4 stands at the top by grade and color. The Charles Jay-Laird Park plain-edge Judd-3 also ranks high. However, that coin shows noticeable obverse spotting. The Norweb coin has appeared with an MS-61 BN grade from NGC, but scratches affect its fields.
That leaves the Kendall coin in a remarkable position.
It may not hold the highest technical grade. Yet its smooth surfaces, balanced color, and strong preservation give it a powerful claim as the most choice Birch Cent for overall appearance.
For early copper specialists, that matters.
Color can change. Surfaces can degrade. Marks can define a coin forever. This coin survived more than two centuries with the look collectors want.
From Bushnell to Parmelee to Jenks to Green
The provenance adds even more weight.
The coin first appeared in the Charles I. Bushnell Collection. S. Hudson and Henry Chapman sold that collection in June 1882. This Birch Cent appeared as lot 1763.
Lorin G. Parmelee later acquired it. He already owned a Birch Cent. Yet he preferred this one and upgraded to it. When New York Coin and Stamp Company sold the Parmelee Collection in June 1890, this coin appeared as lot 7.
It brought $85.
That price deserves attention. In the same Parmelee sale, the combined prices of a silver 1792 disme, a 1792 half disme, and the unique 1792 half disme in copper totaled $87.
In other words, this single Birch Cent nearly matched three great 1792 rarities combined.
Then the coin entered the John Story Jenks Collection. Henry Chapman sold the Jenks Collection in December 1921, where the coin appeared as lot 5571.
S. Hudson Chapman later advertised it for $1,000 in the January 1925 issue of The Numismatist. After that, the coin entered the legendary Col. E.H.R. Green Collection.
Following Green’s death, the coin passed through the Green Estate and dealer intermediaries, including B.G. Johnson. Stack’s later advertised it in its Spring 1949 Special Price List.
Next, Stack’s sold it in the Hugo Stockmayer Collection in July 1952 as lot 175. Abner Kreisberg and Hans Schulman offered it in April 1959 as lot 1166. It later entered the Winfield Scott, M.D. Collection of Chicago.
Finally, Stack’s sold it privately on June 23, 1975, to the collector whose holdings later formed the Henry P. Kendall Foundation Collection.
That owner kept it for about four decades.
A Million-Dollar Cent With a National Story
The 1792 Birch Cent sits at the intersection of politics, design, metallurgy, and national identity.
It reflects the young republic’s need for small change and shows the practical problem of a copper cent tied to metal value. It also captures the symbolic problem of placing Liberty, rather than a ruler, on American money.
Then there is the deeper mystery.
Jefferson told Washington that cents had begun. Washington’s final address did not say so. Somewhere between Jefferson’s draft and the President’s message, the cent disappeared from the official story.
Yet the coins survived.
This AU-58 Judd-4 Birch Cent carries that story in copper. It passed through Bushnell, Parmelee, Jenks, Col. Green, and the Kendall Foundation. It sold for $1,175,000 in 2015. And it remains one of the most compelling physical links to the first year of federal coinage.
The Birch Cent is not just a pattern.
It is a founding document in metal.
