PREV ARTICLE
NEXT ARTICLE
FULL ISSUE
PREV FULL ISSUE
SHEARED SILVER INGOT ANSWERSIn response to the earlier article about Ken Conaway's Silver Ingots of the United States Government web site, Max Hensley asked, "What were the shear ingots made for? Can the serial numbers be correlated with dates of issue, who were these sold to? " Ken provided this response. -Editor
I have found absolutely no information on what the starting sheets of fine silver were made for. Given the numbers of cuts (or sheers) on the ingots I have examined, and the fact these exist on all edges of most ingots, the original plates had to be of some substantial size. These large plates were stamped with the Type III large oval hallmark which appears sheared through on the reverse of a number of examples. This does not seem like a logical way to cast silver since most commonly "bar shapes" were, and still are used. Great question and certainly one that remains high on my research list. 
Moving beyond the original plate production, the distribution into the mainstream can be assumed to have occurred similarly to what is represented by the U.S. Mint Bar Delivery Receipt included in the San Francisco Sheared Plate page on SILVERINGOTS.COM https://www.silveringots.com/san-francisco/sheared-plate-ingots For this very same ingot, No. 1767, I have a scrap silver deposit receipt, an assay and process invoice and the document pictured on the website, the bar delivery receipt. For this particular transaction, scrap silver wear was presented to have processed and in exchange, an equal weight of Sheared Plate ingots was returned to the customer. Regarding dates of issue, the San Francisco Sheared Plate Registry dropdown under "Registries" https://www.silveringots.com/san-francisco/san-francisco-sheared-plate contains all of the dates that I have on these under the NOTES column. The No. 1 Sheared Plate ingot is dated 1952 on the reverse, No. 477 is dated 1954 on the reverse and from No. 1322 on I have found a few that are dated 1955 on the reverse. All great questions and it is good to find another collector out there! Anyone that has any of these in their collection that is not included in the Registries please let me know and I will add them. Contact information at SILVERINGOTS.COM or kenconaway@aol.com Thanks! -Editor
For more information, see:
To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
Wayne Homren, Editor The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
|