Senate Considers Jay Johnson for Next U.S. Mint Director

Jay Johnson is currently awaiting the Senate's seal of approval on his nomination as the next director of the United States Mint.

Who is this guy anyway? What did he do to get such a nomination? There are a lot of coin collectors out there who would love to trade places with him.

What makes him so different?

Small Town Roots

Johnson was born in the iron-ore mining community of Bessemer (population: 3,000) in the upper peninsula of Michigan in 1943. His father owned a hardware store locally and his mother was the town librarian. He has an older brother who is an engineer for Eastman-Kodak and a twin sister who is a teacher. Johnson is on the record as saying his parents had no particular political leaning. Johnson is a Democrat.

The Mint director-to-be took an interest in politics after watching the Kennedy-Nixon debates in 1960. Johnson soon after tried his hand at it, becoming elected student council president at his high school.

Education and Vocation

He later attended Gogebic Community College, received a bachelor of arts degree at Northern Michigan University, then ended up working for an Army newspaper in South Carolina and Texas, after being drafted in 1966. Among those he interviewed were Lyndon Johnson and comedian Jack Benny.

Following this stint in the Service, Johnson graduated from Michigan State University with a Masters degree in radio and television arts in 1970. He later served as an anchor for several television stations in the Green Bay area for about 15 years. He was at NBC affiliate WLUK when he decided to run for political office in 1987.

During his 15 years in Green Bay, he supported local charities, headed the Family Violence Center and was involved with fundraising for Big Brothers and Big Sisters. He also found enough time to be married twice. He is still married to JoLee.

There doesn’t appear to be any numismatic connection to his proposed appointment.

The Transition Into Politics

Johnson was involved in politics while with the news media by covering national conventions beginning in 1972. It was during this time, he realized he was interested in politics himself. He decided to run for office when Johnson determined he wasn’t satisfied with the record of incumbent 8th District Representative Toby Roth.

According to Johnson, Roth spent most of his time with the issue of English being the only official language for the United States.

Johnson could have run for office on the Democratic ticket in 1994, but chose to wait until 1996. Two days after Johnson announced he would run for office, Roth announced his retirement. Johnson defeated State Assembly Speaker David Prosser in the ensuing election by winning 52 percent of the vote. Johnson picked up the name "Klug-lite" because Republican Congressman Scott Klug from Wisconsin was also a former news anchor.

For The Record

Since that time Johnson has been on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and on the Agriculture Committee in the House. His voting record includes voting against bills on juvenile justice, flag desecration, abortion procedures ban and a bill regarding displaying the 10 Commandments, while voting for bills on the parent notification amendment and appropriations for Washington, DC.

Johnson Replaces Diehl

Philip N. Diehl, the US Mint director who will be leaving upon Johnson’s appointment, has held the post since 1994. It took 10 months to confirm Diehl as Mint director. Diehl had previously been a senior staff member for Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen and Bentsen’s chief of staff when Bentsen was in the US Senate.

Johnson served in the House of Representatives between 1997 and 1998 before being nominated to become Mint director by President Clinton in September 1999. A Mint director’s term is five years.

What has Johnson done to get such an enviable position? The same as Diehl did before him--be a good politician in the right place at the right time.

Many may argue that the position of Mint director should go to someone understanding the Mint, numismatics, manufacturing, marketing or all of the above.

Obviously, this doesn’t happen at the US Mint.

Click here for a related story about the future plans of current Mint Director Philip Diehl.

Richard Giedroyc is a numismatic writer, researcher, auction cataloger and coin dealer. He has been in the hobby and business most of his life, now having more than three decades experience in this fascinating hobby field. During this time Giedroyc has been the owner of Paris Bergman Galleries, owner of Classical Coin Newsletter, international editor of Coin World and owner of Giedroyc-Anderson Interesting World Coins. He is currently a numismatic consultant. He has written more than 2,000 byline numismatic stories and contributed to several coin catalogs.