Cool lightside day...

coinpictures

I learned quite a bit today. I do very little with lightside material... I have a few half cents and the occasional slabbed type piece that I've been able to pick up inexpensively, but I know very little about U.S. coinage apart from stuff I've seen in passing and the frequent "show and tell" sessions at the local coin shop.

I dropped by the shop today and there wasn't any new darkside material so I perused the lightside material on display. What caught my attention was a few coins with old ANACS graded certificates (pre-encapsulation). I'd never seen these before. Two things immediately jumped out at me:

1. The fact there were two sets of grades, one for the obverse and one for the reverse. Neat idea!

2. It seemed to me that these coins were quite conservatively graded, compared to what I've seen in modern slabs. I asked my dealer if I was just imagining this, and he said that in many cases the grading was tighter 20-25 years ago. I guess this is what is meant by "gradeflation" or "market grading".

After looking at the coins under strong magnification (to make sure the coins *were* in fact the ones photographed), I decided to pick up two of them for my type set (sorry, no pix):

1. A lovely 1913 Barber Dime in MS60/MS60, graded in 1986. This coin has virtually no marks at all... I've seen MS64 slabbed Morgans and walkers with *far* more chatter and marks than this coin. My dealer said that if it were sent in it would probably make at least 63 today.

2. An 1883 Shield nickel in AU50/AU50, graded in 1980 (!). Dealer thought it would be a 58 by today's standards; he didn't think it would make 60.

Both coins are nice and lustrous, very visually appealing. Got both at graysheet bid, so I think I did well.

I think that buying these in person is almost mandatory, since it's far too easy to swap a different coin, or there might be postgrading damage.

I think it would be cool to see how early of a certificate one could find.

Anyone else have any early TPG coins?

CIVITAS

A few days ago, another dealer near here tried to sell me an old Lafayette dollar with an old ANACS photo cert graded AU-55 by them. The funny thing was it had a HUGE scratch across the obverse (across 2/3 of the coin). Even worse, the scratch was visible in the photo! So they graded it AU-55 despite that. Go figure.

Needless to say, I passed.

Your buys sound a lot better than what I was offered. That's for sure.

Aethelred

I have had the pleasure of looking at quite a few coins in the old ANACS holders. Many coins are overgraded but you can also find undergraded coins from time to time. I would have no problem buying them sight seen, but would never buy from a photo alone.

I have never liked the idea of dual grades, in my opinion a coin can not grade higher that it's lowest graded side. Thus if you have a coin that is MS-63/66 it can't be better than a 63.

lordmarcovan

1. I never cared much for the split grading for two sides, but I suppose it makes sense, in a way.

2. As to conservative grading, I suppose it varied, but I once saw a gorgeously-toned silver three-cent piece with a certificate grade of Proof-60. It later crossed to a more modern ANACS slab (or PCGS, I forget which) as PR64 or 65!

coinkat

I have one remaining ANAC coin with the certificate... IT IS A 1921 Peace dollar... weakly struck but still very pretty and I think is 62.