ANS Launches MACO Archives Website
For Immediate Release
New York, NY
November 30, 2020
ANS Launches MACO Archives Website
The American Numismatic Society is pleased to announce the launch of the Medallic Art Company (MACO) Archives website. This website is designed to provide a glimpse into the MACO Archives and to serve as a location for updates about the collection as the ANS moves forward with the project. View the website at https://numismatics.org/maco/.
Until its bankruptcy in 2016, MACO was one of the oldest and largest operating private mints in the United States. Founded in New York City around 1907, for more than a century MACO employed some of America’s most notable artists to craft commemorative, award, portrait, and other medals for a huge number of individuals and institutions. Many of the most famous medals in the United States—including the Pulitzer Prize Medal, the Randolph Caldecott medal, and official medals of Presidential inaugurations—were produced by the Medallic Art Company.
In 2017 the American Numismatic Society acquired the MACO archives—which consist of over 50,000 individual items, including medals, dies, galvanos, plaques, and photographic records—and set about making these precious resources accessible to collectors, scholars, and all other interested individuals. Central to these efforts is the The MACO Archives website. The site is divided into five categories to facitate navigation:
The MACO Specimen Archive includes basic information for nearly every medal that MACO produced between 1907 and 2013. This is a primary component to the website and can help researchers and interested parties with identifying a given medal.
The Essays component contains articles related to the history of MACO and medals more broadly.
The Photo Archives give a visual glimpse into MACO, especially regarding production of the medals and their recipients from the mid-20th century.
The Future of MACO outlines the long-term goals of the American Numismatic Society for the collection.
Lastly, the Blog is where the ANS will update visitors to the site of the progress being made on the collection in real time. Subscribers to the blog will automatically receive these updates.
“This collection is an invaluable part of American cultural heritage, in terms of art, history, and society,” said Dr. Jesse Kraft, Assistant Curator of American Numismatics, “The ANS is proud to own the collection and happy that we are able to share more and more information on one of the most important private mints in American history.”
The American Numismatic Society, organized in 1858 and incorporated in 1865 in New York State, operates as a research museum under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and is recognized as a publicly supported organization under section 170(b)(1)(A)(vi) as confirmed on November 1, 1970.
