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May 07 2024

Newman Portal Search Hints

Newman Portal searches from the home page are exact text only. If you enter multiple words, it will search for that entire phrase.

If you wish to search for multiple terms all one page, but not in exact order, use the search form at https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/powersearchform. For example, if you wish to locate pages containing the words "Washington," "medal," "birth," and "centennial," enter the search:

ItemContent:Washington AND ItemContent:medal AND ItemContent:birth AND ItemContent:centennial

You can also use Google to search the Newman Portal site. From Google, enter, for example:

"washington medals" site:nnp.wustl.edu

Finally, you can search the Newman Portal document repository directly (https://archive.org/details/newmannumismatic), which, in some cases, will deliver additional results. On this page, check the box "Select text contents" before searching.

For additional assistance, please email us at NNPCurator@wustl.edu.

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Jul 15 2026

United States Mint Releases 2025 Annual Report

Newman Portal has added the U.S. Mint annual report, courtesy of the FRASER archive. FRASER, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis document repository, archives material from the U.S. Federal Reserve System, in addition to other institutions, including the Mint and the Bureau of Engraving and Printing.

Mint issues of 2025 included the Five Freedoms platinum proofs, American Innovation dollar coins, Marine Corps 250th anniversary commemoratives, and many others. Indeed, the final pages of this report detail 37 distinct issues apart from the regular proof and mint set series.

U.S. Mint Annual Reports on Newman Portal: https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/publisherdetail/51

Link to FRASER online archive: https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/

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Jul 12 2026

Mintmark Location Change on 1917 Walking Liberty Half Dollar

Roger Burdette recently posted on an NGC message board “A frequently asked question by collectors is ‘Why was the mintmark moved on 1917 half dollars?’ Common answers cover a wide range of speculation, invention, and bluster. The real reason is revealed by these two recently digitized letters.” Referring to the letters, the Director of the Mint (Raymond Baker) wrote to the Superintendent of the Philadelphia Mint on April 11, 1917, asking why the mintmark position was changed. The Director answered his own question two days letter, noting that the former Director F. J. H. von Engelken ordered the obverse to reverse change because the obverse position was too prominent and appeared as a defect in the die. 

Just for fun we checked ChatGPT to see if AI was responsible for some of the “speculation, invention, and bluster” to which Roger referred. Remarkably, it provided a detailed, accurate answer, even quoting an earlier letter from von Engelken that originally ordered the change.

Link to National Archives record group 104 (U.S. Mint), entry 235 (letters sent by Director’s office) on Newman Portal: https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/archivedetail/512703
Link to NGC message board thread on the 1917 Walking Liberty Half Dollar: https://boards.ngccoin.com/topic/440732-mintmark-location-change-on-1917-halves/#comment-9927341
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