1820 B-5 Bust Quarter
Today the newest addition to my bust quarter collection arrived in the mail: an 1820 B-5! It’s graded G04 by PCGS and comes with this very nice TrueView:
This is the small 0 variety (which I personally believe is tougher than the large and medium 0 varieties), and it is also the rarest die marriage for the date by a pretty wide margin. (For the record, I personally believe that 1820 B-1 is a lot less scarce than its rarity rating suggests.) This marriage is rated as R5, which corresponds to about 50 coins.
This die marriage was struck in 1821, as evidenced by the die crack progression on the reverse. The reverse die was first used to strike 1820 B-2 and 1821 B-4. The reverse die developed a crack through the E in United while being used to strike 1821 B-4. By the time it was used for 1820 B-5, a new crack had developed right of the first A in America (which is visible on this coin!). I recommend checking out the Tompkins bust quarter book for more information about this.
This is now my rarest large diameter capped bust quarter die marriage (my only other solid R5 is 1834 B-5). In my experience, I would say that the 1820 B-5 is scarcer than 1818 B-9, 1819 B-1, 1819 B-4, 1821 B-5, 1828 B-2, and 1828 B-3. I think it’s less scarce than 1821 B-6, 1822 B-2, 1822 B-3 (duh), 1823 B-1, 1827 B-1, and 1827 B-2. I feel like it’s on par with the 1825 B-1 (which I don’t have yet). So I guess that (in my mind) I have the 7th (or so) toughest 1815-1828 quarter die marriage! Consider me happy.
If you have an example of the 1820 B-5 quarter, please post it!
Comments
That's a nice example. Thanks for sharing it!
Great transactions with oih82w8, JasonGaming, Moose1913.
That is a fantastic looking coin for the grade. Congratulations and great write up as well.
Hi NSP, great looking quarter! And congrats on finding one you like and that looks good. There are always 2 rarity ratings for bust quarter varieties: 1. How many exist? and 2. How many look halfway decent?
1820 B-5 is known for having some really beat up examples (I've owned one or two...)
I'd agree mostly with your rarity ranking. But I'd place 1825 B-1 as significantly more common than 1820 B-5. Especially in higher grades. And 1828 B-3 is a really tough coin, again because the really crummy examples are most of the population. Matt
That is an excellent point regarding “how many look halfway decent.” I did a fairly thorough analysis of 1815-1828 quarters that were for sale online early this year to try to gain some information about grades, die marriage rarity, etc. I didn’t keep close track of problem coins vs. problem-free coins, but it felt like at least 80% of them had problems of some sort (even some in straight graded holders had slight problems in my opinion, but were silently “net graded”). Evidently this series was abused by well-intentioned collectors for generations!
One of my first "major" coin purchases as a kid was a nice original VG 1819 lg 9.
I remember exactly what it cost me.
$17.
Two weeks' worth of lawn mowing and paper deliveries.
What a lovely coin. Just about perfect for the grade. And a tough variety to boot. I love it.
Lance.
That is a nice coin, and thank you for the analysis of the variety rarities....Cheers, RickO
Great coin and post, NSP! Enjoyed reading your analysis, congrats on the acquisition.
Here's my humble example of the variety
Liberty: Parent of Science & Industry
Very nice coin. I have 3 1820s but unfortunately none of them are a B-5.
To your point "This is the small 0 variety (which I personally believe is tougher than the large and medium 0 varieties)", I would argue that the medium 0 variety is much harder to find than the small 0, just based on auction offerings over the last several years.
Proof Buffalo Registry Set
Capped Bust Quarters Registry Set
Proof Walking Liberty Halves Registry Set
Hmm I’m not so sure, at least in the mid grades where I like them. I’ve had my pick of nice “medium 0” examples but still haven’t found a small 0 B4 that I like.
Agreed that they’re both scarcer than the “large 0”
Regarding the relative scarcity of the medium 0 and small 0 varieties, I decided to look back at the data from the die marriage study that I did back in January. Basically I attributed all of the 1815-1828 quarters listed on eBay and Collectors.com at the time to try to gain some insight on the relative scarcity of the various die marriages. My 1820 data is as follows:
1820 B-1: 10 on eBay and 19 on Collectors.com.
1820 B-2: 9 on eBay and 9 on Collectors.com.
1820 B-3: 8 on eBay and 12 on Collectors.com.
1820 B-4: 6 on eBay and 10 on Collectors.com.
1820 B-5: 1 on eBay and 3 on Collectors.com.
It’s worth noting that some coins were counted in both tallies, since many coins are listed on both eBay and Collectors.com (I didn’t try to separate them). Obviously this is just a small snapshot, but it’s interesting to see that the medium 0 (B-3) and small 0 (B-4 and B-5) appeared at roughly the same frequency. Perhaps one is more scarce than the other in higher grades. I collect in the lower grades and have noticed that the medium 0 (B-3) shows up a lot more often than the small 0 marriages. This might not be the case in higher grades!
Regardless, I agree that the large 0 variety (B-1 and B-2) is the most common, and my data supports that. I also found it amusing that 1820 B-1 was the most represented 1820 die marriage on both eBay and Collectors.com. I don’t think it’s worthy of the R4 rating that it is often assigned.
Nice pleasing example for the grade @NSP, and I agree with you guys on its scarceness exceeding a number of the varieties also listed as the same rarity. Finding them nice is also mentioned as difficult, which seems to be the case more often than not so far.
I have two B-5's, with the one below from the Don Frederick collection being my set example:
1TwoBits
Very nice coin displays the cracks
That reverse die was a workhorse
Liberty: Parent of Science & Industry
Nice score. I can live with that
Very nice coin for the grade. I have always wanted to get into the Bust Quarters, but the Dime seem to keep me busy and broke!
You can go broke faster collecting bust quarters.
Lance.
Looks really impressive for the grade that you have mentioned.. cheers! And yes, the small O variety is rarer than the other varieties...
Maybe I'm not looking hard enough then, lol. The only medium I've found is actually a mislabeled large 0
Proof Buffalo Registry Set
Capped Bust Quarters Registry Set
Proof Walking Liberty Halves Registry Set
Usually I don’t pursue duplicates, but another nice original 1820 B-5 popped up on eBay for a good price. How could I say “no” to another R5? Maybe I could leverage it in a trade someday. Time will tell…
Nice NEWP! It's amazing that you can now get a coin like this for low premium. That was not the case 10 years ago. Bust quarter varieties are definitely in a slump price-wise, and that's a mixed blessing for people putting sets together. Yes the premiums are down, but many people with tougher varieties just hold them and offerings for nice examples are as dry as I've ever seen.