There are three active mints within the United States (San Francisco, Denver, and Philadelphia). Each of these mints are responsible for the creation of coins that are in circulation within the U.S. Not as well known is the fact that during World War II (WWII) the three U.S. mints also created coins for 26 countries across the globe.
According to a 1945 press release from the U.S. Mint, “Secretary Morgenthau today revealed for the first time in detail the wartime contribution of the United States to monetary systems of more than a score of friendly nations, a tremendous manufacturing job piled on top of record-breaking domestic coinage, and met despite acute manpower and equipment shortages.”
You Can Bank On It
During 1944 alone, the then Director of the Mint, Nellie Tayloe Ross, reported to Secretary Morgenthau that the three minting facilities in the U.S. had minted nearly 800 million coins for “friendly” countries. This, in excess of the three billion coins minted for domestic use.
List of Countries
The 1945 press release also stated, that “The United States has executed coinage orders for foreign Governments since authorized by Congress in 1874, but it has been during the last five years that this business has reached large proportions. The minting of pesos, centavos, florins, riyals, francs, and many other foreign coins of various alloys, all of which must conform to the coinage laws of their respective countries, has become every-day business to the skilled artisans of the Mint. A list of countries for which the United States has made coins during the past five years, as a part of a Good Neighbor policy, reads like a lesson in geography. Included are Australia, Belgian Congo, Belgium, Bolivia, Cuba, Curacao, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Fiji Islands, France, Greenland, Guatemala, Indo-China, Liberia, Netherlands and her island possessions, Nicaragua, Peru, Philippine Islands, Saudi Arabia, and Surinam.”
All coins created for foreign countries during this time were minted at cost, with materials either supplied or purchased by the countries themselves. Silver for coins, on the other hand, was furnished on a lending basis to be paid back after the war.
This cooperation was vital to the global war effort to help keep foreign countries from collapsing from a lack of currency to be released in circulation.
