The Glory of American Money - Augustus Saint-Gaudens' High Relief "Double Eagle” Design

On this Day in the History of Art: Robert Campin died (1444), Giuliano de' Medici died (1478), Gian Paolo Lomazzo born (1538), William Shakespeare born (1564), John James Audubon born (1758), Eugène Delacroix born (1798), first motion picture shown in Hawaii (1906), Dmitri Shostakovitch completes his 4th Symphony (1936)

"Whenever destroyers appear among men, they start by destroying money, for money is men's protection and the base of a moral existence. Destroyers seize gold and leave to its owners a counterfeit pile of paper. This kills all objective standards and delivers men into the arbitrary power of an arbitrary setter of values. Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it. Paper is a check drawn by legal looters upon an account which is not theirs: upon the virtue of the victims. Watch for the day when it becomes, marked: 'Account overdrawn."

- Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Nationality: American
Born/Died: 1848-1907
Creation Date: 1907
Media: Gold coin