1916-S $20 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle, PCGS MS65 (CAC) "Stunning Gem Example"

It is with great pleasure that we at AUCM offer a stunningly beautiful gem: a 1916-S $20 Saint-Gaudens, graded PCGS MS65 (CAC). Gold specialist David Akers writes, "The 1916-S seems to have been minted to a very high standard of quality. The strike is almost always very sharp and the surfaces...do not have the metal flow problems encountered on many examples of the 1915-S. Lustre is always very good to excellent and the color is usually a very appealing rich greenish gold, sometimes with a light orange or coppery tint. High-grade examples of this issue invariably have great 'eye appeal.' " This would be a fantastic addition to a high-end collection of U.S. gold coinage.

Wrote President Theodore Roosevelt to Secretary of the U.S. Treasury Leslie Mortier Shaw on December 27, 1904, “I think our coinage is artistically of atrocious hideousness. Would it be possible, without asking permission of Congress, to employ a man like Saint-Gaudens to give a coinage that would have some beauty?” Two weeks later, on the evening of January 12,1905, acclaimed sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens was in the White House enjoying a glass of wine before dining with Roosevelt and Shaw. The two men—the president and the artist—had an enthusiastic, animated conversation about the beauty of high-relief Greek coins. Dinner saw the three men discussing a scheme for redesigning the cent, the eagle (gold $10) and the double eagle (gold $20), all behind the back of U.S. Mint Chief Engraver Charles E. Barber. “I would have the Mint stamp modern versions of those Greek coins in spite of itself,” said Roosevelt, if the honored sculptor would design them. “You know, Saint-Gaudens, this is my pet crime.” Saint-Gaudens' double eagle saw its debut in 1907.