Mrs. Washington's silver
Cladiator
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Can anyone tell me the story of how it came to be that Mrs. Washington donated silver to become US coins? I've seen one of the coins in a pcgs slab. How many are there? What types? How are they identified as being from her silver? HUGE premiums???
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To answer the question about how it came to be that the silverware got donated (actually deposited) the answer is that the new government did not have silver available yet in 1792 even though Congress had authorized the coinage. An early inventory of Washington's personal possessions incuded a silver set. After 1792 the only set inventoried was a plate silver set and that is all you can see today at Mt. Vernon. This is the accepted evidence on the subject although there is no question that Washington supplied the silver, whether it was from silverware or some other source as that is a matter of historical recording.
--Severian the Lame
<< <i>That's a beauty, Bill. My hat's off to you. >>
Well, thanks for the compliment, but it's really just a matter of saving and buying things over a lifetime of collecting. Back when I was in my 20s I used to envy the "old guys" who had all of this neat stuff. It took years, and I had to say "No" to smaller items, but over time I was able to locate and purchase some really neat coins.
I'll never own some of the great stuff that some of those "old guys" had, but I was able to get a lot of it. This is why I warn some people not to put too much money into really common coins, even those in great condition. After a while you will find that you have a collection that is really rather ordinary. Yes, you have to pay "stong prices" for the time. And yes, it takes some guts, but I'll tell you I bought this coin more than 10 years ago, my ROI on it would rival a lot of other investment avenues.
To date, PCGS has graded “nine” 1792 half dismes in Unc. There are NO (none, nada) 1802 half dimes in unc - NONE.
So, the 1792 half disme is a great coin, available often enough, and costly. The 1802 half dime is a treasure coin, hardly ever available, and costly. Some of the mightiest numismatic cabinets in history did NOT have an example of the 1802 half dime! (Jenks, F.C.C. Boyd, etc). This alone speaks volumes.
While the 1802 is obviously less available as a single date, I would assume that as a type it is much more abundant than the 1792 half disme which was only available the one year. This would seem to somewhat balance things out and explain the value/pricing in the same way that the 1907 High Relief Saint Gaudens as a single year type commands so much relative to its numerical availability. Ditto the 1808 Capped Bust Left two and a half dollar gold piece that was also a one year type. Or was the 1802 also a one year type?
Any guess as to how many of those PCGS half disme submissions were resubmissions? My guess is you could proably half the numbers at least.
Most 1802 half dimes are very low grade with problems and unslabbable; this would tend to reduce their populations in and of itself. This is not as common with the 1792 half disme where a relative hefty supply of “slabbable” examples at various grade points exist. That is probably why the 1792 half disme is available as often as it is for sale/auction (I've seen three examples of the 1792 half disme in past month alone, yet not a single example of the 1802 half dime in the past two years or more). The 1792 half disme has been far more available than the 1802 half dime. The 1792 half disme has been said to be an R3 coin while the 1802 half dime has been said to be an R5. In the scope of numismatica, that’s a meaningful difference. The availabilities of the two is significant.
Your “Chicago to Evanston” analogy is terrific and true Northcoin. I also appreciate your comments about “type” and how it relates here. Still, for me the heart and soul of numismatics can be found in the “dates” rather than the “types.” This is not to underestimate the beauty and joy of “type” collecting but only to illustrate the great significance of the dates. When I think of numismatics in the biggest sense of the word, I think about; 1802 half dimes, 1794 dollars, 1804 dollars, 1913 liberty nickel proofs, 1796 Quarters, 1836 Reeded Edge Half Dollars, 1909 vdb matte proof Lincoln Cents, etc. -dates! When I think of a “type” or series, I immediately head for the dates within that type or series. Thank you for your thoughts Northcoin. I appreciate it.
I am so jealous. This is the first time I've really looked at a disme, outside of a book! I can understand why you are so proud of this coin.
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"No Good Deed Goes Unpunished!"
"If it don't make $"
"It don't make cents""
That picture is as close as I'll ever get to seeing one. Thanks
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since 8/1/6
<< <i>BillJones - Nice photos and thanks for posting. Since the coin is silver I am curious if it has toned to the red-copper color in the photos or in real life does the coin look more like silver and the photos are deceptive? Regardless, it appears that coin has XF details even if it was assigned a VF grade by NGC. >>
The coin is an original gray color in real life. The red you see is from a red light that flashes on my digital camera when I take a picture. Since this photo was shot, I have placed a sticker over that red light since, which has reduced that type of glare.
From a rarity perspective there are an estimated 45 to 50 surviving examples of the 1802 half dimes. Many of those coins are damaged and cannot be slabbed. The finest known examples of the 1802 half dime using the “old time” grading standards are in EF-45. Today all of those coins that I have seen are now in AU holders. There are no known examples of the 1802 half dime in Mint State, and unless there is a discovery, there never should be any in slabs. I hope that “grade-flation” has gone as far as it will go, but that is undoubtedly a vain hope.
The total mintage for the 1802 half dime was 3,000 pieces. Therefore the survival rate was about 1.5%, which is in line with the “1% rule” which is the rule of thumb survival rate for early U.S. coins.
I would guess that there are around 300, 1792 half dismes left. Among those many are holed, bent and repaired, which are problems that are quite common for the half dimes from the 1792 to 1805 era. I’d say that there are no more than 100 to maybe 150 “clean ones” that do not have major problems. The estimated original mintage was said to be 1,500 to perhaps 2,000. The higher survival rate is attributable to the fact that they were the first of their kind.
I’ve read that there are around 15 examples of the 1792 half disme known in Mint State. At least one of them has some very heavy adjustment marks (file marks that resulted from a reduction in weight to the legal standard) that make that piece less than perfectly attractive. I would also like to see more of the 15 since my standards for Mint State are sometimes higher than other people’s standards.
I’ve seen one that I would call MS-65. That piece was offered at auction years ago with at least a $100,000 reserve. It did not sell, but at the time, a wild thought went though my mind that if I sold my whole collection … But then I snapped back to reality.
My piece is properly graded IMO. It has no claims to EF although a couple of dealers have advised me to crack it out and go for the higher grade if I ever decided to sell it. A year or so after I purchased my coin, the dealer from whom I bought it, offered me a chance to trade up to an EF. I just could not swing it financially since it would have almost doubled my investment in the piece, but it was an interesting offer.