A collector friend of mine, Bill, sells insurance and annuities. He had a client pass away recently, and the survivors asked him to look at the coins that mom had. He was thinking it wouldn't be much, but he got there and there were a number of large purses filled with silver, as well as some cigar boxes and a Stroh's beer case, all loaded with coins. Mom had worked for decades at JC Penney's and had pulled tons of coins out of circulation. Bill estimated there was over $80,000.00 in silver at spot value.
He said that they scanned through the quarters and didn't find anything but common dates. There were so many dimes that they couldn't even get through them, so they divided them up by eyeballing everyone's stack (he did tell them to look for the 16 D, 21's and 26 S). He did get to check the halves, but there wasn't much there. But the dollars were a treasure trove. He picked out the 6 best and sent them off to NGC for certification. They all have original surfaces, although a couple of them were given an environmental damage designation because of unusual toning. This was due to being stored in a basement inside a leather purse for 50 years or so.
Bill allowed me to take pictures to share with CCF before he gave them back to the family. I wasn't able to take the pictures at home, so the color is off slightly on some of them, but you get the idea. Don't skip to the bottom unless you want to ruin the surprise:
1877 S
Trade dollar - AU details, environmental damage. This is darker in hand than the picture shows.
1879 S - MS62. The first "U" in Pluribus has metal displaced by a hit, otherwise this would have gone much higher. The black mark on the reverse is on the surface and looked like it was crayon or something. Under a loupe, it didn't look like there was a scratch under that mark.
1892 CC - VF details, environmental damage. Again, this is much darker in hand.
1895 S - F12
1894 S - AU58. The color in this picture is very close to the actual toning color. It's quite striking in hand.
1893 S - G4 - Bill told me when he saw the obverse he couldn't look at the reverse right away. He set it aside and had to come back to it later so he didn't hyperventilate. The white mark on the eagle's leg is on the holder, not the coin.
Bill said that he's always wanted to have a find like this, even if they are someone else's coins. It's the dream of every collector to find a stash that is truly unsearched.
Posted 12/16/2012 10:07 pm
