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About U.S. Coins
Silver
Center Cent
 The first actual record of "coins"
struck
in the U.S. Mint can be found in Chief Coiner
Henry Voigt's account book on Dec. 17,
1792.
In actuality, the coins
were patterns.
They were cents made by putting a silver plug
worth three-fourths of a cent into a copper blank
worth one-fourth of a cent.
The obverse
depicts a female bust with flowing hair and the
date 1792. The reverse
has a laurel wreath and ONE CENT in the
center.
 The Silver Center cent patterns
represent an interesting attempt to produce a
smaller coin, yet maintain its intrinsic
value at one cent.
Only a handful of
genuine specimens exist, with numerous counterfeits
known. The cost of making the blanks revealed the
project's impractical side.
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