The Story of Money by Betsy Maestro

Author:Betsy Maestro [Maestro, Betsy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

In 1790, the Constitution was ratified and the United States of America officially became a country. The new Congress agreed on a money system that would become law and would be used by all the states. This new system would have a dollar as the basic unit and would use both gold and silver in the coins.

A mint was opened in Philadelphia in 1792 to make gold, silver, and copper coins. There was not enough precious metal available to make all the new coins that the country needed, so ordinary citizens contributed candlesticks, jewelry, and other valuable objects to be melted down. There is a story that the first coins minted were made from George Washington's own family silver. No one knows if this is true. Although foreign coins were ordered to be melted down as well, Americans continued to use them for many years.

The first Philadelphia Mint

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.