Post Your Canadian Tokens

An interesting member of both Canadian colonial and US post-colonial collections...

Would have liked to picked up an example in a better grade but it is what it is. I'd say that it's a VG (between the strong date and weak strike to the NE), but I'm curious as to what others think.

A generally underappreciated token in my opinion.

Wade, did you mean VF or VG? (I just noticed the two letters F and G are adjacent on my keyboard.)

The reason I ask is that mine was graded "vf-ef" when I bought it...well, traded for it. Maybe I should be a bit more exuberant than that?

What do you think?

Thx~
Tom

@Daltonia:
TPG are not very consistent in their evaluation of this token. I have more than thirty examples in my photo bank, and there is a lot of nonsense.

However, as far as your token is concerned, this one is beautiful (It's one of the most beautiful I've ever seen). Personally, I would have graded this +/- AU-55, maybe even more...

Concerning the token of Blargish, I would have graded this one between F-12 and F-15.

As an example, here is a token graded VF-30 by ICCS and coming from my photo bank (Note, I also have copies graded VF-20 and having a comparable level of wear):



Another example graded MS-60 by ICCS:



Another example graded AU-58+ by PCGS (Ex. Temple):

I appreciate the input from all of you on that NA Token...grading any of the "crudely minted" tokens has always been a challenge for me because as a collector I never seem to handle more than one or two of them, so forming any impression at all becomes pretty difficult.

Blacksmiths, Tiffins, Ords, Busts & Harps...my eyes glaze over as soon as I start to consider condition. Maybe I should start a photo bank too...I certainly see the value in that. British evasions and non-regals, too...I've got a bunch of those, including a common "Bitit" token, that could run anywhere from Fair to VF, I suppose, depending on who's looking at it on any given day.

I wonder: If I sent this North American Token to PCGS or NGC, would they tell me whether it's brass or copper?

Again, my thanks to all of you for the "Instant Upgrade." My token is flattered indeed! And my thanks to you also, Blargish, for posting yours, without which I wouldn't have looked at mine for the first time in 15 years or so.

Hoping everyone here is staying well~
Tom

ainsivalavie, maybe as the next logical step you could publish a grading guide for Canadian tokens. If there's any consensus to be found between and among the various TPG's, that is, and if they let you use their photographs.

Remember the ANACS PhotoGrade books?

As you illustrated above with your North American Token exemplars, there is an awful lot of variance out there, and on top of that I keep tripping over MS-60 to MS-63 slabs that in my collection would be called gef or au, at best. I'm sure you've run into the same thing, right?

One book wouldn't be able to cover the different grading anomalies unique to each issue.

There are sooooooo many different types and almost none of them "grade the same" (unlike most decimal series).

Some of the most challenging (IMHO) are the dragon slayer series, bust & harp series, and the 1781 North American Token. Those used to grading decimals (and most TPGs) are off by 20 points on any given day.

As for a photo reference collection... I started saving as many TPG'd pics as possible, but found myself spending more time collecting pictures rather than collecting actual coins.


Back to Dalton's 1781... looking at PCGS graded examples I have little doubt that if yours was sent in that it could be the highest graded. See below PCGS AU58.

If you're talking about the Charlton variety, it's LC-9A2. However, if you are talking about the Courteau variety, I may be mistaken, but I am fairly confident that it is variety #9f.