1893 CC Morgan

Alice, now that I've read the rest of the thread, I didn't realize you're talking about a collection of considerable size. If it's at all possible, you might want to get one of our Morganphiles here on CCF to take an eyeball look at the whole collection. It'll save you a lot of time, money, electrons, and heartache trying to get us to give an honest appraisal via images of the collection, one by one; there's too much lost in the imaging process. With this number of Morgans, you potentially could be talking about quite a large sum of money, value-wise and it would be unfair to you and your Uncle for us to judge such a collection electronically. They need to be appraised first-hand by one of us (who I trust) or by a professional coin dealer (who may or may not be trustworthy); if you know any dealers in your neck of the woods, run their names through us and if any of us have any experience with him/her, we'd be in a better position to advise you. Some banks and investment firms keep a list of coin appraisers who have been "vetted"; I used to be one with A.G. Edwards. Problem with hiring an appraiser is that it'll cost money.

I don't know where you live, but we MorganHeads are scattered around the country and there may be one near you. I'm in the Arizona desert in the middle of nowhere, so it would be almost a miracle if you were in even the next state over although I'd be willing to travel just to eyeball a large collection of Morgans ("Have Morgans, Will Travel" - apologies to Paladin ).

It takes a long time to develop grading skills, so if I were you, I wouldn't try to tackle this project all on your own. Also, with a collection of this size, listing them on ebay before somebody fairly knowledgeable on Morgans (and Peace dollars which you also have) takes a look at them. One piece of advice: do not try to sell them as a Collection Lot on ebay; you won't get anywhere near what they would be worth if sold individually.

Maybe if you could list the dates and mints, we could sort the potentially good dates from the more common coins. Use this forum (Coin Grading Practice) so we would know where to find the thread.

Schenectady. Incredible. I was born in Troy, grew up in a small village in Delaware County, but maintained contact with the larger Capital Region since I had several relatives work at GE. My father went to RPI, my mother and sister-in-law went to Russell Sage, my brother, sister, brother-in-law, brother-in-law's brother, nephew, and niece all went to RPI (I went to Cornell). My aging mother is 91, has Alzheimers' and is in Stage 6, but living in an Alzheimer's home in Cohoes. My sister and her husband live in Averill Park, just retired from the State three years ago, and I only departed NYS for the life of a fulltime RVer now in Arizona. Upstate NY is really bad for my arthritis which is why I'm here. I am intimately familiar with the area or, at least I was. I won't be back into the area for at least a couple years for medical reasons, not to mention the cost of gas. I probably won't even attend my mother's funeral when the inevitable happens soon.

There IS (or was) a very good and reputable brick and mortar coin and stamp shop in Watervliet: Uncle Sam's Coins and Stamps on 3rd Ave, where 3rd and 1st merge together; his shop is sandwiched in the flatiron type intersection I believe. I don't know if he's still in business - he was a one-man operation and I don't believe he ever got online. If he's still open, I would recommend him. He never steered me wrong nor tried to take advantage of anyone I ever heard.

Contrapositively, there ARE a few less-than-ethical coin dealers in the greater Albany area who might try to take advantage of you. For example, I know one who would deride your collection as having little value, then would offer you $500 for the lot "just to take it off your hands". The 1893CC is worth at least than alone.

Fred

Heh. I was born at Albany Medical Center, grew up in Altamont, and went to school in Guilderland.

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Originally posted by alliegirl

Oh WOW Dave! Another "neighbor"!! I love to take the grandkids up to the Altamont orchards in the fall to pick apples, and pick up pumpkins. And of course the Altamont Fair is a must every summer!! Am actually in Rotterdam, not far from the Guilderland line. You must have spent some time hiking through Thatcher Park on the trails. Love looking for fossils in the rock up there. Nice to know you're from the area too!!

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Did somebody say Thatcher Park?

Me, at the top:



Same spot I was standing, from the Indian Ladder Trail (the rock outcropping way in the background:



Where I took the second pic from (right center, in the background:



On a clear day you can see Vermont, but this wasn't a clear day.

After looking at those nice pictures of home, all I can say is that it might be nice now, but give it a few days, it'll be white again! When I was back east last summer, I left here on 20 April when it was 95F, arrived in NYS about 28 April into temps in the 20s and it was snowing. It didn't stop snowing until sometime in JUNE! That left two months of summer before winter started again. When I left in early September, it was in the low 40s.

Back to Uncle Sam's Coin shop, I do not know if it's the same guy running it as I knew it before. He was elderly ten years ago, so check out the shop first to see if there's been a change in ownership. If it's a much younger person, then the old man retired or sold out. You'll have to "get a feel" for a new owner's ethical standards.

Dave, if you're still in the area, you might want to check out Uncle Sam's and get a sense of the shop's ethics if there's a new guy. Go Morgan hunting - you seem to know the series pretty well.

Fred

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Originally posted by SuperDave

Unfortunately, I'm in Atlantic City now. There's darn few dealers around here, and what's worse there's no hills.

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I've spent a couple years in NJ, mostly while in uniform (first with the Boy Scouts, but mostly with the Army - Ft. Dix and Ft. Monmouth). It's got a lot to offer: nice beaches, the Pine Barrens, Cape May, Brigantine Natl Wildlife Refuge, and a lot of people and congested roads. There used to be some hills around the Morristown - Mendham area, but they may have torn them down for some urban renewal project. It's been a few years (15) since I've been there.

Susan, you must have had some ND rub off on you. I've usually agreed with ND on grades from images and he is very tough, usually putting us both at the bottom of the guesses. I've also been tough on Morgans based on my own Morgan collection, mostly from PCGS which would place this 93CC at VF-30 since my 93CC VF-30 is almost identical to this one (mine shows very slightly less wear which is why I stated VF-25 in the range). However, as you stated, PCGS may have been lighter on Morgans in the past, has really tightened up Morgan grades lately, so you very well might be right that this is F-15 and might be graded as such by PCGS these days. I don't know what the other top TPGs might say (I'll find out soon enough this fall). My 93CC VF-30 was graded several years ago; I would not dare to resubmit it to PCGS nowadays. It very likely would come back in a body bag.

If they get any tighter, we're gonna be debating among ourselves whether a coin is P-01 or AG-02. PCGS isn't leaving much room on the bottom of the Sheldon Scale. We might have to get into the negatives: WP--02 (Worse than Poor minus 02) or HP--03 (Horribly Poor minus 03) or IC-06 (Is this a Coin? minus 06).

I recently sent in a 79CC Morgan expecting back a G-04. Instead, PCGS graded it G-06. Maybe it's in the Good grades they take up the slack.