Denver Mint Facility
In 1858, when gold was discovered in Colorado, hundreds of merchants, miners and
settlers moved in for their stake. A year later, the city of Denver was founded;
and in 1863, the U.S. government established a mint facility there. Today, the
United States Mint at Denver manufactures all denominations of circulating coins,
coin dies, the Denver "D" portion of the annual uncirculated coin sets and
commemorative coins authorized by the U. S. Congress. It also stores gold and
silver bullion.
Historical Background: Assay Office to Renaissance Palace
For its first 46 years, the United States Mint at Denver was only an assay office in the
Clark, Gruber and Company Bank Building. Miners brought in gold dust and nuggets to be
melted, assayed and cast into bars stamped with their weight and quality. By 1895, the
Assay Office was booming, bringing in more than $5.6 million in gold and silver deposits
annually.
In 1904, the government decided to convert the Assay Office into a working mint, and built a much grander facility, an Italian Renaissance style building modeled after a Florentine palace. In 1906, its first year in operation, the new Mint produced 167,371,035 gold and silver coins valued at $27 million. Today, the Denver Mint's output can exceed 50 million coins a day.
Denver treasures its historic mint building, which is one of Colorado's oldest institutions.
To see this beautiful facility and learn its history, take a United States Mint
public tour
.
You will enjoy special exhibits, artifacts from the United States Mint's early days and
up-close views of the coin making process.
Tour Information
Please refer to the Mint Tours pages for details regarding tour information.
Other Mint Facilities
Philadelphia || San Francisco || West Point
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