1908-D $20 Saint Gaudens Double Eagle, No Motto NGC MS64

This specimen would be a superb addition to the collection of a numismatist who desires one great near-Gem Saint-Gaudens double eagle at an affordable price.

The Saint double eagle was only produced without the Motto 'In God We Trust' during 1907 and part of 1908. President Roosevelt felt it was blasphemy to place the name of God upon our coinage. However, Congress disagreed and had the Motto placed upon the coin during 1908. NGC has graded 614 of this issue in MS64, with 52 finer.

Augustus Saint-Gaudens, the sculptor-medalist who crafted the design of this classic work. Painting by Ellen Emmet Rand, 1905.

Numismatic scholar and art critic Cornelius Vermeule writes, "The double eagle is perhaps the most majestic coin ever to bear our national imprint." Discussing both Saint-Gaudens' $10 eagle along with his $20 double eagle, Vermeule writes, "Both coins seems as modern a century after they were conceived as any issues, American or otherwise, produced in the past generation, and compared with what has been tolerated heretofore in the United States, both burst as artistic skyrockets in the horizons of our academic creativity."