Early Life and Career
Gobrecht was born on December 23, 1785, in Hanover, Pennsylvania, to Reverend John C. Gobrecht, who came to America from Germany in 1755, and Elizabeth Sands, with ancestry going back to 1642 in the Plymouth Colony. After apprenticing in Manheim, Pennsylvania, he engraved ornamental clockworks in Baltimore, Maryland, until he moved to Philadelphia in 1811 to join Murray, Draper, Fairman, and Company, an engraving firm, around 1816. He invented a medal ruling machine in 1810, which he improved upon in 1817. In 1823, Mint Director Robert Patterson sought to engage Gobrecht as assistant director, but Gobrecht declined the position. Instead, in December, Gobrecht sought the position of chief engraver of the Mint, writing to President James Monroe. Instead, the position went to William Kneass.
In addition to his professional activities, Gobrecht was an inventor, inventing the camera lucida, a talking doll, a kind of melodeon, and the medal-ruling machine, which reproduces relief on a plane surface.
Read more about this topic: Christian Gobrecht
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