A "Peace" of grading exercise from someone who's learning...

ursabear

Hello all!

I've recently acquired (for a very small sum) two raw Peace dollars, a 23S and a 23D. I've done a bit of reading, and would like to know what you pros think of them. I've got a grading opinion on them - but I thought I'd show what I thought through before coming to a conclusion, and pictures of the coins.

I reviewed the "PEACE",
the feathers on the eagle and particularly the right wing,
Liberty's hairlines both the ones arranged about her face and the hair drawn back over her head,
the eagle's neck behind the beak and particularly the beak detail,
the left (or hindmost) wing,
the leg feathers and talon detail,
the motto and the other lettering throughout the coin,
the rim surfaces,
and the date
(Did I leave anything out?)

From my reading, XF Peace dollars must only have slight wear on the leg feathers, talons, facial hair and head hair - with most hairs visible in detail.
VF seems to show much more wear on the leg feathers, talons and "high spots" hair.

Here are the pictures. The pictures are tuned to show the rim dings and the hairlines very prominently, in hopes that you could get a good angle on the wear. In person, under natural light, the harlines and wear are much less obvious, and the dollars actually have a nice silver color to them.
23 D Obverse
23 D Reverse
23 S Obverse
23 S Reverse

My thinking is that the 23 D is a net strong VF, and the 23 S is a net VF.

What do you think?

dorkkarl

both coins appear to be cleaned (or at least soap & watered) xf's to me. great pickup!

K S

ursabear

dokkarl - I have the strong impression on first sight that they have a cleaning - probably an old cleaning. There is no trace of tarnish anywhere on the coin (even the reeds), despite the fact that they've been in many pockets many times.

keets

i'm nothing close to an expert on peace dollars, but since it's such a low relief design the detail should fade with a little circulation and that seems to be the case with these coins. i'd say VF-XF with an awful lot of contact marks. i've got some circulated dollars that have been lying around in 2x2's for over 40 years and they haven't toned much at all so i don't think a judgement can really be made about cleaning. i got mine at christmas in the late 50's early 60's when they could still be had at banks. circulated coins just don't tone as mint state do which probably accounts for the color here.

al h.

FC57Coins

I was leaning toward VF because of the contact marks Ursabear - nice coins nonetheless.

Frank