About Us

Private Mint News is the culmination of a passion for documenting things for posterity, this version being the fourth incarnation of the name.

History

Timeline

1. May 2019: PDF books on Bolen’s Pynchon House medal is published using Pandoc.
2. May 2019: Draft of Gallery Mint Museum selections are made available to select parties for review but is too large at 160MB.
3. September 2020: The first website hosted on https://privatemintnews.com is published with a focus on a few less common pieces using Hugo.
4. November 2021: First presentation is given at So-Called Dollar Fellowship Gathering on So-Called Dollar Store Card Mules, but not published online afterwards.
5. December 2021: Second version of Private Mint News is published on Medium.
6. March 2023: Second presentation is given at So-Called Dollar Fellowship Gathering on So-Called Dollars for War Service.
7. April 2023: Third version of Private Mint News is republished on https://privatemintnews.com using MkDocs, including all content on Medium, the 2 presentations given at the So-Called Dollar Fellowship gatherings and the previous books.
8. 2026: Fourth version of Private Mint News is rebuilt as a static site with Astro and a custom design, keeping every existing article address.

Version 1

Version 1 was a good start. Posts were authored in Markdown and rendered by Hugo. It was eventually replaced due to the need to maintain a custom Hugo theme. Version 1 had 7 articles as shown below dating from September 27, 2020 to October 27, 2020. Those articles are now in the Modern Private Issues department, with the two pairs of related posts each combined into one article, and their original addresses redirect there.

Version 2

Version 2 used Medium which resolved many of the formatting issues but made it more difficult to maintain version control for content compared to git-based source control. The content also wasn’t accessible via Markdown once authored for backup and maintenance. Version 2 had 3 articles as shown below dating from December 2, 2021 to December 17, 2021. All three are on this site: the gathering report, the 1883 Newburgh Centennial sale, and the introduction.

Version 3

Version 3 used MkDocs. It was easy to maintain and enabled incorporation of Remark-based presentations and PDF-based books.

Version 4

Version 4 is the current version. Articles are still written in Markdown and built into a static site with Astro, now with a design made for coin and medal photography. Pages load resized photos, and every photo links to its full-resolution original.