National Museum of American History - Gallery of Numismatics

I've enjoyed currency for many years.  No, I don't mean American money that I can spend, though that is useful.  I've enjoyed collecting foreign coins that I will rarely or never be able to spend.  The exception was when I got a large number of Canadian coins.  I was able to use a number of them on a trip to Ontario.  Otherwise my collection has stayed at home unspent, but over the years it has grown thanks to the kindness of missionaries and foreign travelers that I've known and asked for a few coins or bills.  I've also added to it myself some, such as when I went to Thailand a decade ago--I made sure not to spend all of the the money that I exchanged so that I could bring it home and add to my collection.

When we went to the Smithsonian last spring and toured parts of the National Museum of American History I was naturally drawn to the Gallery of Numismatics.  I think there is probably a Benjamin Franklin quote for just about every situation.

The Smithsonian's National Numismatic Collection (NNC) is America's collection of monetary and transnational objects. This diverse and expansive global collection contains objects that represent every inhabited continent and span more than three thousand years of human history.

The NNC is comprised of approximately 1.6 million objects including coins, paper money, medals, tokens, commodity and alternative currencies, coin dies, printing plates, scales and weights, financial documents and apparatuses, credit cards, and objects that reflect established and emerging digital monetary technologies.
--from National Museum of American History website

These coins are from a collection put together by former president Ulysses S. Grant.  His wife Julia donated these Japanese coins after his death.

Obviously all of the coins are inside secure cases and the doorway to the exhibit looks like an entrance to a vault.

I definitely think that the artistry of money is something that is amazing to explore.  There are so many different bills and coins from all over the world that are wonderful works of art.
"...the art of money is not only in its design, but also in the way in which numismatic artwork can convey the importance of money in society and its power as a means of communication for governments and artists."
--from exhibit signage

The first national $5 bill produced in 1864 contains a replica of the painting of Columbus that was installed in the Capitol Rotunda.

I have a number of books full of smashed pennies, or as they're labeled in this display "elongated coins."  I love collecting them whenever we travel.

The artists behind these medals and plaques include August Saint-Gaudens, whose home we visited in Vermont in 2018.

Have you ever thought about the messages communicated by money?
Through images and text, governments use money to make political and cultural statements about a nation's identity, leadership, heritage, and values.  Money created for special circumstances, such as tokens and emergency currencies, conveys messages about its time and place simply through its creation and use.
--from exhibit signage

In colonial America there wasn't one set of official coins in use, instead money from a variety of different locations and countries was utilized, such as some of these examples.  Some of the most popular were from the Spanish colonies in Latin America.

Today of course we have a number of non-traditional currencies like credit cards and digital forms of payment.

These bills were issued by South Sudan back in 2011 as soon as it became independent from Sudan.

Personally I'm not a huge fan of the Euro, but it might not be because of the reason that you might think it would be--I hate the fact that we had so many different currencies to collect and instead now just have one (though I know the backs are different), so it isn't as much fun to collect.

I like tracking maps by the addition of new countries, but I supposed that you could also track them by the appearance of new currencies or the disappearances of old ones if you were an avid numismatist.

As different as bills can be from each other, there are also many features they can have in common, like historic portraits being very popular.

These are examples of ancient Chinese coins and money alongside some much newer Japanese and Korean examples.

These are more modern Chinese coins from the last couple centuries.

Have you ever seen an $100,000 note before?  It is real, but it never entered general circulation

This is the end of my posts on our visit to the National Museum of American History, but you can check out a few more pictures in this album.

~Matt