Vintage Silver Highlights - California Crown Mint Eagle/Bell Trade Unit
Collection Highlights -
I have another interesting vintage silver piece. After digging around I believe I have identified this as the California crown mint eagle/bell silver trade unit. The only problem is that while it looks identical on the obverse and reverse, in the trade unit scales are identical my opinion to the ones made by California crown mint, this round is missing the CCM mint mark on both the obverse and reverse.
If you look at the first link below you will see what I consider to be identical images of the silver trade unit, but to the left of the Bell the letters CCM are stamped, and below the scales is another set of CCM. Without these mint marks I am questioning whether this was truly minted by CCM or was a an exact replica copy, knock off, Early edition without mint marks, I really don't know.
The California crown mint started in woodland hills California in 1980 through 1991 and operated under the California crown mint as well as crown mint throughout that time. Most of their items were marked with the initials CCM and the fact this one is not is what is causing me some slight concern. I still think it's most likely a virgin minted by them, but I am not 100% sure
California Crown Mint
Eagle/Trade Unit
Obverse
It's a pretty solid obverse design with a nice looking eagle and Liberty Bell motif. The eagle looks like it is mid dive with its talons stretching out to grab its prey below. While the Bell is always a nice resemblance. It has a slight attitude and the fact that across the top it says America America. Not sure why it's put under twice other than maybe they felt they needed to fill the space.
Reverse
The reverse is a very traditional trade unit. The leaf designs varies slightly from unit to unit, and the scales are the true Hallmark of identifying who minted them. This one is very close to all the others but is a dead on ringer in my opinion to the rounds minted by the California crown mint. It has the same design, texture of the crossbars as well as the box and Dot in the upper half. The count of coins is the same on the left as well as the height of the weights on the right. Only thing missing is the initials ccm.
I might have other CCM products I need to dig through
If I find some other CCM products later down the road I will make reference to this post and Link them together to keep my entire CCM collection reference intact. I think I might have a couple of bars and potentially a different round. It'll take quite a while to dig them out so we'll see what we find.