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| Company type | Private Expedition |
|---|---|
| Industry | fabricator  |
| Genre | Lewis and Clark Expedition |
| Founded | 2005 |
| Headquarters | Grayson, Virginia |
Area served | United States and Canada |
| Parent | Medalcraft Mint, Inc. |
| Website | numismatics |
Medallic Art Company, Ltd. based inDayton,Nevada was at one time "America's oldest and largest privatemint" and specialized in making academic awards,maces, medallions, along withchains of office and universitiesmedals for schools.[1][2] After goingbankrupt in 2018, theAmerican Numismatic Society purchased their significant archive of artmedals,dies,die shells,plaster casts,galvanos, photographic archives, and other important cultural material. The Society has launched an initiative, the MACO Project, to identify and publish this material to make it available to researchers.
Henri Weil, "a highly respected Frenchsculptor living in New York City," founded the Medallic Art Company in Manhattan in 1903.[3] Henri, along with his brother Felix, worked at Deitsch Brothers, a company that made die-struck ornaments for woman's handbags.[4] When the styles of handbags changed, the Weil brothers repurposed the presses to make medals and purchased Medallic Art Company from Deitsch.[4] One of its first commissions was theHudson-Fulton Medal of the Circle of Friends of the Medallion in 1909.[4][5]
In 1972 the company moved toDanbury, Connecticut, then toSioux Falls, South Dakota in 1991, and finally to Dayton, Nevada in 1997 where it operated a 115,000-square-foot (10,700 m2) facility.[3]
The Medallic Art Company made custom 2D and3D medals[6] and "has produced some of the world's most distinguishedawards such as thePulitzer Prize, thePeabody Award, theNewbery andCaldecott medals, and theInaugural medals for eleven U.S. Presidents."[7][4]
In July 2009, Medallic Art Company waspurchased by Northwest Territorial Mint.[8] The Northwest Territorial Mint declared bankruptcy in April 2016;[9] in 2018, after protracted bankruptcy proceedings, Medallic Art's "tradename, website, customer lists, archives, tools, specific machinery, certain company owned Medallic dies and other property" were purchased by Medalcraft Mint, Inc. (Western District of Washington (Seattle) Bankruptcy Petition #: 16-11767-CMA). Medallic Art's archives and about 20,000 pre-1998 dies were acquired from the Northwest Territorial Mint 2018 bankruptcy by theAmerican Numismatic Society, a New York City-based institution dedicated to researching, curating, and educating about coins and medallic arts.[10]
From 1963 to 1975, a medallic series in bronze and silver was produced depicting the Americans honored in theHall of Fame for Great Americans at New York University. A total of 96 medals were issued, designed by 42 sculptors.[11]
In August 1971, Joseph B. Hartzog, Jr., director of theNational Park Service, awarded a contract to theKalispell, Montana, firm of Roche Jaune Inc. to produce a series of 37 medals, called the "National Parks Centennial Series", that depict a scene in each of America's national parks. The medals were designed byFrank Hagel and struck by the Medallic Art Company in bronze and silver.[12] The bronze medals were sold by subscription in 1972 and each month a new medal was issued. The bronze medal production was unlimited (bronze medals were minted as recently as 2017 by the Northwest Territorial Mint), but the silver medals were sold in complete sets to buyers as a limited edition series capped at 7,500 sets.
The Medallic Art Company also struck medals for two other important medallic art series in the United States: theCircle of Friends of the Medallion[13] andThe Society of Medalists.[14] The Society of Medalists medals were minted annually from 1930 to 1995 at varying mintages based on the number of subscribers.