1794 50C O-101a MS(PCGS#39201)

The D. Brent Pogue Collection, Part I

拍卖行

Stack's Bowers

批号

1095

等级

MS64

价格

4,739,895

详细说明

The Finest 1794 Half Dollar in Existence The Birth of an Enduring Denomination First Year of American Silver Coinage 1794 Flowing Hair Half Dollar. Overton-101a. Rarity-3+. MS-64 (PCGS). The best preserved survivor from America’s first half dollar issue. The finest known example of the first American half dollar, a legendary specimen whose provenance includes three of the most famous American numismatic connoisseurs of all time. When the Overton reference book on half dollars 1794 to 1836 was first published, in the conservative grading of the day, this was the only known Mint State example. So it was for decades. The D. Brent Pogue Collection coin has shone like a beacon for more than a half century, the pinnacle of the 1794 half dollar census, the definition of what a 1794 half dollar should be. The cartwheel luster is intact, spinning like a top as it slides around both sides. The deep golden gray toning incorporates hints of blue and an overtone of olive, nearly identical on both sides. Sharp details and flawless centering can only suggest the triumph the coiners must have felt when a specimen that looked like this fell from the dies. The first 1794 half dollars, presumably including this example, were delivered the same day as the 1794 dollars, on October 15, 1794. This half dollar is a more successful production than most of the 1794 dollars, showing good axial alignment that leaves the stars on the left as sharp as the stars on the right and minimal evidence of planchet adjustment. Every star shows at least some central detail. The denticles are remarkably complete and well-realized, sharp and rounded, and those on the reverse show the sort of elongation that suggests an additional effort to torque the screw of the screw press. Some light doubling of peripheral obverse elements, including LIBERTY and the stars, also suggest a concerted effort to bring the details up well, a double strike, of sorts. Vestiges of planchet adjustment are present on the eagle’s chest and on the eagle’s wing on the right, affecting the field in between to a lesser extent. Some adjustment marks, mostly effaced by the pressure of striking, are seen at the absolute central obverse, hidden in Liberty’s hair. A tiny natural planchet flaw is seen on the rim below star 1. Very few post-striking defects are noted: a thin scratch between stars 10 and 11, a curved scratch across the top tendril at the right side of the wreath near the second S of STATES, a notable mark behind Liberty’s head in the field and a few smaller ones elsewhere. The obverse die is perfect, while the reverse shows a die crack from between denticles north of 9:00, over the leaves of the wreath to the wing, and another die crack from a denticle tip through F of OF to the leaf below, where it takes a right turn to the next single leaf and the center of S. The first die crack is seen on all known 1794 half dollars, while the latter is indicative of the later die state, known as Overton-101a. The half dollar, upon its conception, was a nod to tradition. Dimes were cutting edge, the tenth that fit into Jefferson’s revolutionary decimal scheme. Dollars were conservative, a copyist’s attempt to produce a Spanish milled dollar (also known as eight reales) that would feature the new nation’s designs and mottos. The half dollar is just a step removed from that ethic, copying the Spanish four reales, a fractional piece that fit ideally into the Spanish system but clumsily into our decimal plan. The most popular coin from the Spanish dominions in early America was the two reales, with the value of a quarter, whereas far fewer four reales were produced in the Spanish mints of Central and South America and a concomitantly small number of this denomination circulated in the United States. The half dollar is one of our most enduring denominations, first produced in 1794 and struck with every date since but for about a dozen. After coinage of silver dollars ended in 1804 the half dollar denomination flourished and fueled the engine of American trade in those years. Average mintages between 1825 and 1835 were higher than any decade until the 1870s. Over six million half dollars were made annually in 1835 and 1836; mintages that high would not be seen again for consecutive years until the centennial in 1876. Today, the half dollar is a largely forgotten denomination, coined for collectors and occasionally seen at blackjack tables, but a novelty in circulation. The Kennedy halves of today can trace their lineage back to this small issue in 1794, of which this is the single finest specimen. Jimmy Hayes, whose famous type set we auctioned in 1985 and who once owned this coin, remarked to us: “Of all first-year-of-issue United States design types, the 1794 half dollar is the rarest in Mint State.” This piece, throughout its history, has sold for roughly one-fifth of what the finest known 1794 dollar has brought. The record-setting Amon Carter 1794 dollar brought $1,250 in 1947; this coin brought $210 in 1945. In 1984, the finest known 1794 dollar brought $264,000. The next year, this coin realized $55,000. In 2013, the finest known 1794 dollar found a new home at $10,016,875 in our January 2013 Americana sale. Today, in 2015, we expect the finest known 1794 half dollar to keep pace. From the D. Brent Pogue Collection Provenance: F.C.C. Boyd Collection; Numismatic Gallery’s (Abe Kosoff and Abner Kreisberg) sale of the World’s Greatest Collection of U.S. Silver Coins (F.C.C. Boyd), April 1945, lot 2; unknown intermediaries; a half dollar specialist in Chicago, via Stack’s; Jimmy Hayes Collection; Stack’s 50th Anniversary sale of the Jimmy Hayes Collection of United States Silver Coins, October 1985, lot 50; Stack’s sale of the E. Richard Collection, October 1989, lot 693; RARCOA to Douglas Noblet, by sale, March 1993; Douglas Noblet Collection; Bowers and Merena’s Rarities Sale, January 1999, lot 1. Est. $500,000-$750,000