During the Ming Dynasty, there were no silver dollars made in China itself, only silver ingots, and only a small amount of silver coins from overseas flowed in, mainly not as a circulating currency, but only a collection of some wealthy people. Silver ingots are of different fineness and size, making it very inconvenient to trade and use. There is a more important hidden danger that if the area controlled by the security army does not have its own independent monetary system, the Ming army does not need to attack militarily, as long as there is an understanding of the economic blockade of the security army, the security army will be defeated without a fight, and there is no way to hold on for a long time.

In order to make a silver coin, it is necessary to determine the style of the silver coin, and this Zhang Chu decided to borrow the most famous style from later generations. However, Zhang Chu changed it. A writing and painting of the Ming security silver dollar style baked, one side with Zhang Chu's side portrait, surrounded by the words "Ming security forever safe", the back of the branch surrounded by the word one yuan, Zhang Chu decided to abolish the circulation of silver in the future, so directly changed the two to the yuan. However, with Zhang Chu's painting level, he felt ugly after painting. For this reason, Zhang Chu specially ran to ask Li Mei to paint a portrait of himself. At the beginning, Li Mei's painting always wanted to pay attention to the layout charm or something, Zhang Chu said after reading it that it was enough to draw a head, so when the draft was finalized, it became only a head portrait on the side of Zhang Chu, surrounded by eight words "Daming security will always keep safe".

The weight of the silver dollar was set at 7 coins and 2 cents, of which 89% was silver and 11% was copper. As a coin enthusiast, Zhang Chu still remembers these data very clearly. The style was set, and Zhang Chu immediately ordered someone to find a steel mold for hand-carving and stamping by craftsmen. Construction of the mint began at the same time.

As a secret factory, in order to ensure safety, the mint was built in a secret ravine with a stream in the mountains outside Zhongyang County.

Making silver dollars is not an easy task. Zhang Chu used local materials and decided to use simple, rough, and handmade traditional tools to mint silver dollars. Silver dollars are made according to the traditional techniques of silverware, such as silver melting, casting, printing, chiseling, etc.

In the days that followed, Zhang Chu stayed in the mint all day long, and worked with the workers to design the plant, install equipment, improve the process, and after more than ten days of hard work, the mint was built and produced qualified silver dollars. Although Zhang Chu was very familiar with every detail of all this, Deng Qingnian insisted on holding a groundbreaking ceremony and invited Zhang Chu to visit the production of silver dollars.

The ceremony began, and Zhang Chu led the crowd to visit the making of silver coins in the order in which they were minted.

First, silver and copper, the raw materials for the production of silver coins, were weighed on simple scales, melted in proportions into large crucibles, and then poured into casting molds to cast into strips.

After casting, the strips are rolled again and again by a newly made hydraulic press to the standard thickness required for coinage.

The blank cake for the printing of silver coins is made by a hydraulic punch. The strips of standard thickness enter the die, flush down the blank cake, and the edge chips are weighed and returned to the melting place.

The blank cake is annealed in the cake oven and restores its original softness. The worker then passes the blank cake through a groove between a turntable and the crescent plate, so that the edge is convex, which is convenient for the pattern to be formed during embossing, and can reduce the wear and tear of the pattern during circulation.

The final work is completed by a huge hydraulic press, the water power drives the huge cast iron stamping parts to install a finely carved steel stamping head, the stamping head is lifted, a worker in time to put the blank cake in the steel mold on the surface of the lower anvil, and then let the upper stamping head accurately and quickly stamping on the lower anvil, so that the blank cake stamping form. In this way, hundreds of silver dollars can be produced per day. After stamping and forming, it has to go through chiseling and engraving to produce qualified silver dollars.

Zhang Chu picked up a silver dollar, stuck the tips of his thumb and index finger in the center of the silver dollar, put it to his mouth and blew hard, the silver dollar actually made a sound, and the voice was clear and soft. Zhang Chu was satisfied and put the silver dollar into his pocket, which would be a cultural relic. Deng Qingnian and others were even more excited, and they all held silver dollars to admire, the security army finally had its own currency, which is something that only the emperor can do, Zhang Chu can see that his ambition is not small, follow him, maybe he can become a founding minister or something in the future.

Zhang Chu's idea is farther than theirs, in fact, there is a problem of coinage, once the coinage right is seized, not only can ensure their own financial security, but also can be levied on the people who use this currency, coinage is the most obvious in the era of paper money, the United States in later generations is through the use of US dollars in international trade settlement, established financial hegemony and levied coinage on various countries, the wealth of each country unconsciously flowed into the United States, and in exchange for just a green paper called the dollar. In the era of metal money, there was also a coinage sharp. Even if the actual value of the currency itself is lower than its face value, it can still be circulated in the market according to the face value. In order to make short-term profits from coinage, minters reduce the precious metal content and fineness of their coins and issue them at a premium, known as "coin trimming". At this point, seigniorage actually evolved into income from the difference between the face value of the currency and its actual value. The greater this difference, the more seigniorage. Moreover, in the future, Zhang Chu also wants to implement the banknotes of the security army on the basis of silver dollar credit, if it can succeed, then there will be a considerable income, and the temptation for Zhang Chu, who is short of money, is very huge.

After telling the person in charge of the mint to do a good job of safety and security, and encouraging the workers to work hard, Zhang Chu left the mint, and Zhang Chu's chariot had a stronger driving force.

The mint in this ravine is constantly improving its processes, producing faster and better quality. The silver dollar produced circulated to all parts of the Ming Dynasty and was very popular, and people rushed to use it, because there was the word "eternal peace" on it, and this silver dollar was called the silver dollar of peace. But later, in order to call it conveniently, people looked at the side portrait of the person above and called it directly: "Zhang Datou". Zhang Chu was annoyed when he found out, how could he forget this stubble.

If there is silver, there must be a bank, and if there is a bank, there must be someone who manages the bank. In particular, the president of the bank must be a person he can trust. In later generations, it is customary that money should be managed by a wife, but the premise is that you must have a wife. Zhang Chu, the manager of the bank, selected a group of various people from Zhongyang to build the basic framework of the bank, but this president has become a problem, Zhang Chu always feels that the money is still managed by his wife. But how can you have a wife?

Zhang Chu assessed his situation, it is indeed difficult to have a wife, but it is very convenient to rob a people's daughter or something. So he decided to go back to Yanchang County to do a robbery of people's daughters.