Michael Schmidt had this to say about one of the patterns mentioned in last week's issue "lot 293 -- Copper Pattern of 1/4 eagle 1803 sold to a Mr. Moses for $.10 (ten cents)"

The reference to Kettle tokens sent me scurrying to my library to find L. B. Fauver's 1981 book, "Exonomia Symbolism & Classification": "The Kettle firm was begun during the 1780s by Henry Kettle, and his sons Thomas and William joined the firm sometime probably shortly after 1800. Thomas Kettle took over responsibilities about 1812 and continued to run the business until at least the late 1830's...

The vast majority of Kettle pieces served as counters... their great similarity in both design and size to contemporary gold guineas, gold half guineas, gold one-third guineas, and to American gold quarter eagle and gold half eagles." (pp v-vi)