1951 50C Booker T. Washington MS65 认证号02384345, PCGS号9424

Ron Guth

The original sales brochure (illustrated above) with a 1951-dated Booker-T. Washington Half Dollar attached, appeared at the February 2016 Long Beach Expo and was obtained by David Hall Rare Coins.  It is a highly unusual brochure because the purpose of the Booker T. Washington Half Dollar was to raise money for a memorial birthplace.  The Americanism (or anti-Communism) theme was intended for the Washington-Carver Half Dollar, first issued in 1951.  Thus, this brochure is an unusual transition piece which projected the purpose of the new coin onto the old.

It's interesting to note that early Redbooks combined the Booker T. Washington and Washington-Carver issues even though the coins had completely different designs and purposes.

The source of the brochure and coin was Santa Rosa, CA dealer, Jack Beymer, who explained that he purchased three of them over the counter at least twenty years ago (and "probably more").  Jack gave one to a doctor client from South Africa and held onto the other two brochures until 2016.

William Shamhart of Numismatic Americana has handled just about every different type of original "go-withs" and paraphernalia associated with classic U.S. Commemoratives.  This was one he had never seen before.