Best Of

I'm glad my Flowing Hair Au coin doesn't have the dumb privy mark.

Anyone else with me?

Very nice!
I too find these intriguing.

@goldbuffalo said:
Already a Fail

Auction has been advertised for well over a month, start on time...

Nope. They are doing the smart thing and signing up latecomers. Their job is to maximize revenue for the Mint. Not to stick to a schedule. Given the feeding frenzy, it looks like the exact opposite of a "Fail."

@cheezhed said:
Question: How long is this auction?

As long as it takes. The more bidding activity, the longer the auction.

Tim

Remember there's NO buyer's premium. The hammer is the final price.

@davewesen said:
I like that National picture. What do you call it? a coat of arms, company logo, trademark?

I call it a logo

@jmlanzaf said:

@ChrisH821 said:

I think the underlying question is how was a nickel reproduced (at least relatively) accurately at 2X+ scale.
What I find interesting is that it has a mintmark, so someone created this from an already struck coin, or less likely, from a prepared die.

I don't follow this at all. Many of these oversized novelties are made for "key date" coins. A 1950-D qualifies. The engraver need only have seen pictures of a nickel to recreate it. Those 3 inch 1877 Indian cents or 1913 nickels are created from molds that are not made from anything but pictures.

My point is that large novelty coins always have a cartoonishly bad look, proportions or relative relief is always wrong. This appears to have been made by somehow making a mold of an existing coin at ~2x scale to make this copy, rather than hand engraving a new one. The mint mark is an indication, not proof, that the mold was made by copying a coin.
If Braddick had shown us this 'coin' with no context, people would probably have identified it as a cast copy, if you show one of those big novelty coins without context, people would immediately say it's a bad fake or correctly ID it as a large novelty coin, quite different.

@Goldbully said:

@Optex said:
Now it looks like the auction is starting 15 minutes later.

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Due to the extremely heavy call volume in the last hour, we have delayed the start of the auction by 15 minutes. The sale will begin promptly at 9:15AM/ 12:15PST.

Last minute bid limit approvals?

I guess if you get enough coins slabbed and pay a fee, you can get any design you want within reason.