BRYAN MONEY

BRYAN MONEY

At the time of the financial panic of 1893, the US money supply was backed by gold. The Populist party wanted more money minted and turned to the concept of a dual money standard -- gold and silver -- as a way of increasing the available money supply. The US had vast silver deposits. Generally, the "working man" and the West favored the dual standard, while the industrialists and easterners favored the single gold standard. William Jennings Bryan chose the dual standard as a principal platform issue for both the 1896 and 1900 elections. Most Bryan Money was produced for the 1896 election. Bryan, a Democrat from Nebraska, ran unsuccessfully against William McKinley of Ohio in both elections.

Bryan expounded the free coinage of silver using the ratio, 16 ounces of silver = 1 ounce of gold. Free coinage of silver means a person could bring silver ingots to the United States Mint and have them coined. Approximately 53 cents of silver would produce a silver dollar. If the government had issued dollars containing a full 100 cents worth of silver, they would have been larger than a standard silver dollar. Bryan's opponents quickly exaggerated the oversized dollar and made base metal caricature pieces produced in various base metals. The makers of Bryan Money were craftsmen and non-craftsmen (as evidenced by what they produced) of varying experience and skills, but all with a desire to express political opinion through the production of Bryan Money. Bryan Money was produced for profit and sold by manufacturers of novelties and, in some cases, the top silversmiths/jewelers in New York.

The two resources that should be consulted when collecting Bryan Money are Fred Schorenstein's comprehensive book Bryan Money, published in 2001 by Token and Medal Society and still widely available and Farran Zerbe's "Bryan Money", published originally in the July, 1926 The Numismatist and reprinted separately since then. References to Schorenstein below are to his numbering system for Bryan Money.

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