1834 B-5 Bust Quarter

msch1man

I recently picked up this 1834 bust quarter (from a fellow forum member). This is the B-5 die marriage. It's the rarest die marriage among 1834 quarters and is actually fairly rare overall (R-5 according to the books I've got - not sure if there are more recent ratings that are different). Anyway, I was pleased to find it and thought I'd share. Opinions welcomed.

If anybody else has this variety, please share...I'd love to see them!

hchcoin

Now that is a nice coin.

scubafuel

Nice looking B-5. They are tough coins! The small size quarters are more abundant overall, but the scarce varieties seem just as hard to find as their larger cousins.

lostincoins

I like this quarter as it appears that she is smiling with a slight smirk, could she know her worth?

hchcoin

msch1man

scubafuel - couldn't agree more about the small size quarters. Although there are plenty of 1834's for sale (relatively speaking), it seems like 99.9% of the 1834's that I see for sale are B-1's.

hchcoin - I really like your B-5...looks like very even, nice original fields that provide a perfect contrast...I like that look...very cool coin.

scubafuel

That's a great coin HCH. Nice pickup from Heritage, if I remember correctly?

The B-2 which shares this reverse, also seems quite elusive.

I just found this B-5 recently.

msch1man

scubafuel - the B-2 is pretty hard to come by from what I've seen. I'd love to find a nice VF B-2 example. The 1835 B-2 also used this same reverse die and some of the 1834 B-5's may have been struck in 1835 according to the Tompkins book...which is kind of strange when you think about it! Tompkins also notes that star 13 is usually flatly struck, which you see on your coin, but it also looks like star 1 and 11 are flatly struck as well on your example (mine's way too circulated to really see a real difference in the strike on the stars). Interesting.

Your B-5 is awesome. People that don't collect bust quarters probably don't realize how scarce of an example that is. It's an R-5 overall, but I haven't seen anything above VF for sale recently. Awesome coin. Looks to be in AU-50ish? Regardless of what PCGS may have graded it, I think it's awesome.