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When grading Morgan dollars, always look for any break in the luster. A break in luster means your coin is not mint state or uncirculated. A break in luster is synonymous with wear.

If you have the coin in hand, cartwheel it around slowly. On the obverse look at the hairline on the front of Miss Liberty. On the reverse, eagles right wing tip and the feathers on the breast are the places to look at wear and luster breaks.

Examining Contact Marks on Coins

PCGS - May 24, 2000 Contact marks appear on the face of this Morgan $1.
Reprinted with permission from Professional Coin Grading Service (PCGS). Excerpt taken from "Chapter 5: Elements of a Coin's Grade" from the book The Official Guide to Coin Grading and Counterfeit Detection
CONTACT MARKS

Contact marks can occur on coins in many ways. When business-strike coins are ejected from the coining dies, they drop into a container. In 1792, this was a small receptacle; today, large hoppers are used for this purpose. Most business-strike coins have contact marks before they leave the mint! After the receptacle became full, it was emptied, and the coins were placed into kegs or, later, cloth bags. Transportation to banks in kegs and later in cloth bags also accounts for some of the contact marks. Banks then opened the kegs or bags and placed the coinage into cash drawers, again allowing for more coin-on-coin contact.

When looking through bags of coins, one may find a coin or two with almost no marks. This is a minor miracle, when one thinks of the weight (50+ pounds for a bag of 1,000 silver dollars) and the miles traveled in stagecoaches, trains, and later, trucks. Obviously, the heavy coins (half dollars, silver dollars, ten dollars, etc.) are more prone to these types of marks than are smaller coins. Also, the softer-metal coins (gold, silver, and copper) are more likely to receive these marks than are nickel coins. If a coin survived from the mint to the bank drawer relatively unscathed, and a collector obtained it immediately thereafter and preserved it, a high-grade coin existed. Most coins were not so lucky.

There are other ways coins can survive with few contact marks. It was common practice to sell coins to visitors of the early Mint or present them to visiting dignitaries. The Lord St. Oswald coins discovered in England in the 1960s are examples of these. The Lord St. Oswald 1794 silver dollars are relatively free of marks and may have been caught in a glove from the coining presses. The coins saved from the melting pots by members of the annual Assay Commission are another way relatively mark-free coins may have survived. All of the mints had to send coins for assay to this commission, although usually only a random sample was destroyed in the assay process. Obviously, there were some Assay Commission members who saved certain of the survivors; many of the 1873 rarities are believed to have been rescued by the Assay Commission.

The only 1893-S Morgan dollar graded MS-67 by PCGS is rumored to have survived in this way. Indeed, the coin is free of the contact marks seen when coins are placed in bags, and it and other coins may have survived relatively mark-free in this manner. J. M. Clapp started obtaining coins directly from the various mints in the late 1800s and his son sold his collection to Louis Eliasberg Sr. through Stack's, in 1942, for a reported $100,000. Mr. Clapp was a visionary, and some of the most mark-free coins, especially gold coins, come from this source.

There are two basic types of coin contact that are encountered. The edge of one coin hitting the surface of another is one of these, causing what sometimes are referred to as Reeding Marks, although for plain-edge coins this would not be technically correct. These are also called bag marks, but not all of these marks occur in bags, so again this is not technically correct. These marks also may result from an object other than another coin hitting the surface of a coin. The second type of coin contact is sometimes called bag or roll friction. This is characterized by friction or contact, often just slight luster breaks, on the high points of coins, often confused with wear. (See the discussion of Wear in The Official Guide to Coin Grading and Counterfeit Detection for a more in-depth view of this.) There are other variations of coin "contact." These also are discussed under Wear and include hairlines, album slide marks/lines, cabinet friction, and flip rub.

So if I'm understanding this correctly, the chances of finding a uncirculated Morgan with absolutely no marks on it are slim to none, yes? What is the highest grade that has been given to a Morgan? I love this place.

Thanks for the information, I really have gotten into learning about Morgans, they are a Beautiful coin. I'm studying the engravers now & finding information seems to be limited. Can you or anyone offer any assistance? Thanks Lee

OZ, I like the idea of your topic, is the 1893-S coin you speak of the same one pcgs labeled from the Eliasberg collection, which was toned beyond belief and sold for somewhere around 750,000.00,about a year ago? Then made its way to the Jack Lee collection?I always wondered how could any one see the details clearly enough to make a grade like that through the toning, I would also think the name involved could not of hurt !!

Permit me to mention The Coin.

One expects early San Francisco mintages to be found in extremely high grades; there are a rare few between 1880 and 1881 which have been bestowed with the lofty grade of MS69.

And then there is The Coin.





Jack Lee, the man who did it right the first time so well that any subsequent collection of Morgan dollars will always be compared against his, owned this coin and the slab bears his name.

MS69 is worth $50,000 for an 1880/1881-S Morgan. If you can find one; there's only a handful and the owners ain't inclined to sell.

The 1896-S MS69 Morgan sold for $402,500. You feel me?

I have heard that there's an 1889 in MS69. I would give a kidney to see that coin; the selling price would reach 7 figures without a doubt. At least, I'd pay that kind of money for that coin, if I had the money to spend.