Can we discuss this morgan (Revised)
![[Deleted User]](https://wc.vanillicon.com/c928a3070142e36e101e8ae66688b50d_100.png)
[Deleted User]
Posts: 0 ✭
I purchased this from a legitimate auction house. I did not pay top dollar but I did pay uncirculated money. You guys and gals have a way of looking into things that I cannot see. This will help me learn. I am not concerned with getting burned here. Nobody set me up to screw me over. I purchased this off my own free will and I was not persuaded or deceived.
What do you think of it?
What kind of grade could it be?
I will post images once I receive if. In anticipation of receiving it I thought it would hopefully be enjoyable to discuss and learn.
Thank you.
0
Comments
From those photos it is hard to assess. What is your definition of a legitimate auction house? The coin appears to be raw and I think you need to buy certified coins. You also should view them in hand. I do not care where you are buying raw coins from you will continue to be disappointed more than not. I f a coin is not certified your first thought should be why not. The tuition you are going to pay will be huge. Buying already certified will lower the tuition big time.
At a minimum, you should be bidding/buying coins that have better images than this (I assume these are the auction images).
From what I can tell it looks like a 63 give or take, but there could be hidden problems as well.
I would only gamble on such a coin with images like that if I could get it for 60 money tops. And that’s knowing that the coin is likely Unc, from the old GSA hoard.
I think you guys are right. I had already purchased this before the last nightmare scenario and was obligated to pay the auction house.
I have already stated that I will be purchasing certified coins moving forward.
As far as legitimate auction house goes, what I meant was an auction house I am familiar with and have purchased items other than coins from. I was not disappointed.
The purpose was to really be able to spot issues even from poor images. I agree that these are not good.
I know I'm amongst friends here and I am sharing my journey in collecting.
The fuzzy images make it appear that the coin grades at least MS63. But for all I know, it could be cleaned, with the cleaning not apparent.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
We can tell better once you get it and post pics. Hard to tell from those pictures. Looks ok but won't know until your pics
Successful BST with ad4400, Kccoin, lablover, pointfivezero, koynekwest, jwitten, coin22lover, HalfDimeDude, erwindoc, jyzskowsi, COINS MAKE CENTS, AlanSki, BryceM
Difficult to properly assess the details on the coin from those pictures. Could be MS.... Please post clear images when you receive the coin. You will get honest input that you can learn from. Good luck, Cheers, RickO
In auctions, personally, I would never bid on a raw coin.
Beware of "legitimate auction houses", whatever that means. Stick with well known numismatic auction houses.
Of course I'm biased. Nice first year CC Morgan. Pics are difficult to asses the grade but many of these raw CC's came from the GSA sales. Most were in MS61 to MS63 grades and seldom any higher. I look forward to your pics. Nice pick up!
bob
I wouldn’t be surprised by anything between AU-Details/cleaned and MS-64. I hope it’s actually on the nicer side of that spectrum. As others said, probably low MS.
This coin aside, if you want to bid on coins from an auction house, I would advise using Great Collections and Heritage.
Regarding the coin, impossible to tell grade or value based on those images.
I have already purchased several coins from GC and I have been very happy with the outcome. The advice to purchase from well known auction houses is well received and completely understood.
Agree it looks like MS63. But poor photos immediately make me suspect they are poor in order to obscure a problem.
They might be a legitimate auction house for other items but if those are their images then they're not legitimate for coins unfortunately.
With a coin like that which is a very common date you can have your choice of dozens and dozens of examples already graded with the look you like at any given time. No need to gamble on poor images you will lose that gamble a lot more often than you win.
Based on the images provided, it looks like it could be pretty nice but as others have stated, the images could be hiding problems. I hope it works out for you. Looking forward to seeing better images.
RIP Mom- 1932-2012
The images are really, really poor, but folks have already pointed that out. The coin appears to be most likely mint state and the small rim bump beneath the first L of DOLLAR on the reverse looks to be minor enough to be easily ignored. These CC Morgan dollars are fairly easily found in either their original GSA holders or already certified by PCGS and/or NGC and I realize you wrote here that you are going that route in the future.
One question I have for you is why don't you tell us wha the "legitimate auction house" is? Someone here might have experience or information that might help.
In honor of the memory of Cpl. Michael E. Thompson
For the following stuff your coin will not be this color (should be more typical silver) as I am just messing with the adjustments to 'see' things better. You can see how much I messed with it by the change in the background color from a grey to a blue.
The contact marks I believe show better now on the obverse device and some fields. Frost breaks and other light contact. Looks like a contact mark in front of the ear and hair curl. The marks might be a little heavier toward the chin and jaw. I don't really see anything abnormal here but noting the marks. I suspect there is some color changes on the coin due to toning and/or a contaminate on the coin. If you buy it, then I would soak it in acetone as it could have something like pvc on it and you want to remove this as it can continue to progress. As others have noted, it is not possible to know if there are other things going on from these photos. As you saw in the previous thread as the coin is rotated or lighting changed other lines and things can show up.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=wwmUMvhy-lY - Pink Me And Bobby McGee
.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=D0FPxuQv2ns - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Maybe I'm Amazed
RLJ 1958 - 2023
There are some lines by M of UNUM which make me wonder if they are die polish, cleaning lines or die cracks. We need better pics to tell you anything.
If you bought from a legitimate auctionhouse, was it in an auction? If so was the price so good you just could not pass on it? Was it a live auction where you were biddiing against people that could have seen the coin in hand? If so, you rarely get bargains. If the auctionhouse pictures are all like that, why would you bid on any? That coin could be a problem or quite a range of grades from pictures given.
It appears to be uncirculated. But if there are any fine parallel hairlines from a "wipe" on it, that would change the situation considerably. The only way to make sure it doesn't have that is to view it with the lighting at all different angles.
I can't remember the name of the auction house but they had pictures like those and the coins were cleaned. You can't trust anyone anymore. BTW I did buy them reason enough. I didn't go back either.
Saying "You can't trust anyone anymore" is going way too far.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
These were all raw coins. There was a few certified. @MarkFeld
You need to buy certified coins is what I meant.
All good information. As far as legitimate auction house I guess I need to rephrase so I don't get snarred up trying to explain what I meant and needing a work around. What I meant was I have purchased items from this auction house in the past and I have always been happy with my purchases. As many of you are aware I am in the middle of a nightmare scenario with someone who cleaned and polished coins to deceive me and get me to pay a fairly high price. With that said I will never buy a raw coin from an individual or auction house again unless I can put eyes on it. I think the only exception would be from a well known member on this forum.
I never want to be in this position again. I added this morgan to show my mistakes in the hopes that other people will see it and learn as well.
I anticipate that this will not be a cleaned or polished coin meant to look like something else, however, as has been pointed out it very well could be. This was a live floor bidding auction along with online bidding. I believe this auction house is fair in the fact that an actual underbidder exists. I have attended a live auction here befofe. We were not able to make the 4 hour trip because I only wanted two lots. I won both. I always use a credit card so if for some reason there is a problem I have recourse.
If I had the option to cancel this I would but I don't. I made my bid and I won so I need to pay the auction house.
If this coin is cleaned or damaged I will call the auction house and discuss it. If it's AU I guess that's my problem.
Thanks for coming on this journey with me. I will post images when I get the coin.
While I agree that buying raw coins that cost real money, when you don't get a chance to see the actual coin (and/or if you don't have the knowledge base to determine the grade/condition of the coin), is a bad idea, I take a bit of issue with the blanket "don't buy raw coins sight unseen" and "if it's not graded, there's a reason" that gets tossed into discussions.
The vast majority of my collection is comprised of raw coins in coin albums. And I bought them from reputable internet vendors. And they typically cost in the range of $5-$50. And they come with a free return privilege (which I've used very occasionally).
It makes no economic sense to get a $30 coin graded, and I like having the unencapsulated coin in the album. And, if it happens that I paid $30 for a coin that's actually worth $15, I will survive.
This coin is due to arrive here today. Is it okay if I start a new thread on it?
I was going to post a thread titled "1878 CC Morgan arrived today".
I just want it to be uncirculated anything beyond that will be considered a plus.
I have another lot from this same auction house with a pretty good mix of civil war tokens, and other interesting coin exonumia that I will start a discussion about. Hopefully it will be a good weekend.
It’s your choice, but I think it would make a lot more sense to update this thread, rather than start a new one. If you do the latter, viewers who are unfamiliar with this thread and the background story will be lost and/or have to go read this thread to know what’s going on.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
No problem. That's why I asked. I will edit and post UPDATED.
This will be my last purchase over $100 without some guidance.
Okay here it is in living color.
I am not saying anything until I hear from you guys. I added the card that came with it. It's probably insignificant.
Let me know if I need to take more images. I don't mind
SUNLIGHT
Looks mint state to me.
In honor of the memory of Cpl. Michael E. Thompson
Me too,
Shipped Sep 23 1988? Geez i guess it took a while to arrive.
Successful BST with ad4400, Kccoin, lablover, pointfivezero, koynekwest, jwitten, coin22lover, HalfDimeDude, erwindoc, jyzskowsi, COINS MAKE CENTS, AlanSki, BryceM
Yea I'm patient. It gets boring looking out the window for 40 years waiting for UPS but they finally showed up.
It is enough of an expensive coin to buy slabbed not raw. That it hasn’t been slabbed should arouse concern / suspicion.
Not necessarily. Things come up for auction from estates every single day. No reason for suspicion here. This is a beautiful coin. No doubt about it.
Cool as it looks good from those photos. Kind of what I expected with the light contact marks a little heavier toward the jaw and down. Those lines on the chin appear to be what I call roller marks and don't really impact the grade.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=wwmUMvhy-lY - Pink Me And Bobby McGee
.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=D0FPxuQv2ns - Ruby Starr (from 'Go Jim Dandy') Maybe I'm Amazed
RLJ 1958 - 2023
Whenever I take an image of one of my coins I try to show it for what it is. In other words I won't hide the flaws I make sure they show up. With that being said and the suggestions to use photograde many times, I am having no problem matching this coin with a 66 or possibly a 66+.
Possibly a controversial statement but it would be reassuring to have an idea of what some of our more seasoned experts think. Again I can take more images. This is the cleanest Morgan I own.
Yes I spotted the same on one of the 66 and 66+ Morgan's while trying to grade this for myself.
From a recent post on the BST board someone thought it was inappropriate to question why a graded coin was not submitted to CAC [it had no CAC sticker which didn't mean that it wasn't submitted] however here it is routinely advised to wonder why a certain coin was not slabbed.
There are many reasons a coin may not be slabbed, not all of them bad. Since this is a PCGS message board and many who participate here collect only slabbed coins, it's not too surprising to find that raw coins are looked upon with suspicion. If the only coins you look at are in plastic because you think raw coins probably have problems that would keep them out of a holder, you'll end up with a skewed viewpoint of what actually exists in the market.
For a beginner who is going hog wild buying everything. You must take things in context to the matter at hand. This advice was given to try and help this collector not pay a massive tuition.
If I remember the thread you are talking about wasn't the issue that someone questioned a coin currently being sold. I could be wrong but I thought the issue was that the question could of been done private message and not disparage the coin in a public forum.
In any case it was not me and you are comparing apples to tacos. I stand behind my advice to this individual collector.
So your advice to this collector, who is just starting out, is to go out and buy a bunch of raw coins. I disagree immensely! If you feel comfortable in your knowledge to buy raw coins more power to you. New collectors should be really careful buying raw coins. I learned the hard way and am speaking from personal experience.
Gentleman
I have already stated that this will be my last raw purchase. It will either be slabbed or reliable eyes will be on it.
I appreciate your concern and comraderie.
@MasonG
Just curious did you have a mentor or were you self taught? Did you just automatically know good coins from bad or did you pay tuition like so many other collectors? Did you ever buy a raw coin for real money and pay the Piper? just curious as some one who is still learning.
It's not considered good form to question something someone is selling publicly. If you have a question on the BST it's considered polite to ask in pm. Someone showing off a purchase here and asking opinions is entirely different.
https://www.the4thcoin.com
https://www.ebay.com/str/thefourthcoin
Not entirely sure why they look kinda grainy, but from what I can see, it certainly looks mint state. Without clearer pictures it's hard to say where on the scale it will sit approximately. It does seem to have great original luster too!
Nice pick!
https://www.the4thcoin.com
https://www.ebay.com/str/thefourthcoin
If you are buying raw coins in the 5 to 50 dollar range you should not get killed. When you are buying raw coins in the 500 to a 1000 dollar range as a new collector that scares me. Again apples to tacos.
As I said in the post you quoted....
I think you’re being way too optimistic about the coin’s grade. There appear to be multiple marks on Liberty’s face and neck, as well as in the upper left obverse field.
Mark Feld* of Heritage Auctions*Unless otherwise noted, my posts here represent my personal opinions.
You also said
I take a bit of issue with the blanket "don't buy raw coins sight unseen" and "if it's not graded, there's a reason" that gets tossed into discussions.
While I said (your first question if a coin is raw should be why) it was not a blanket statement to all collectors. It was given to this collector to try and provide him some helpful information. What would your advice to him be?
??? I didn't make any such recommendation.