Would it bother you to know . . .
Singapore
Posts: 578
. . . that this very rare Immunis Columbia / Shield Reverse, which appeared in Superior's February 2001 auction in a PCGS XF45 holder -
- and sold for $18,400 all in, had previously appeared in Stack's May, 1984 Auction of the Harold Bareford collection of New Jersey coppers and was described like this:
'Important and Very Rare New Jersey Immunis Columbia. . . . Even dark brown. Very Fine . . . . Unfortunately, someone has altered the date to read 1785, although this must have been done a long time ago'.
Thats called 'tooling', and its bad.
And it would bother me plenty.
- and sold for $18,400 all in, had previously appeared in Stack's May, 1984 Auction of the Harold Bareford collection of New Jersey coppers and was described like this:
'Important and Very Rare New Jersey Immunis Columbia. . . . Even dark brown. Very Fine . . . . Unfortunately, someone has altered the date to read 1785, although this must have been done a long time ago'.
Thats called 'tooling', and its bad.
And it would bother me plenty.
Singapore
0
Comments
On a side note, I would never call that XF45, even taking into account the primitive minting conditions and the strike.
VF sounds more like it to me.
You can see that the 6 in 1786 is somewhat oddly shaped on an uncorrupted example, so someone could miss that tooling unless they were specifically looking for it, I guess.
It might also interest people to know that when coin #1 sold in 1984 it brought under $2K, while a similar coin without an altered date sold in 1983 at the Roper sale for over $7K. Back then this coin was damaged goods.
And Lordmarcovan - some of these are quite weakly struck in the centers, as evidenced by coin #2 I posted where you will note the letters around the periphery are quite sharp while the figure is almost devoid of detail.
I wonder how it was known it was tooled in 1984 but it wasn't picked up when it got slabbed. I agree that genuine 6 is oddly shaped, but still... if there is a big difference in value, I would expect it to be scrutinized.
Even if the date hadn't been altered, and it had been tooled in a different spot, it should have been detected.
That picture of coin #2 is really interesting - how the center is so weak and the edge so strong.
Hats off to you guys who can track down a coin's history after nearly 20 years! Impressive!
New collectors, please educate yourself before spending money on coins; there are people who believe that using numismatic knowledge to rip the naïve is what this hobby is all about.
I've seen coin #1. I'm wondering, it it was the only one known, i.e., if there were no 1786's to which it could be compared, would you be able to look at the "5" and know that it was tooled?
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.