Carson City Dollar

Taking a break from doing this year's taxes. Looks like I'm going to have to call up one of my mutual fund companies, as it looks like they don't have my 1099's available for some reason. I never did get anything mailed, and I don't see it available online despite them having them available from previous years. Strange.

Anyway, for Christmas, JC had one of my coins professionally graded. I bought it as a teenager many years ago when I was pretty big into collecting coins, and it's been my favorite coin ever since. It is an 1891 Morgan Dollar minted in Carson City in uncirculated condition . You can see the CC mint mark below the eagle on the reverse of the coin (probably need to click on the images to see them in full size in order to read the letters).

Another thing to note is that this coin is what is called the "Spitting Eagle" variety. There was something a bit off with the die that produced it, which led to a little bit of extra metal being added making it look as if the eagle is spitting. It's a common variety for this year, so while cool looking, it doesn't add any premium to the coin's value.

I remember buying it for about $120 as a mint state coin. Now that it's been graded by the Professional Coin Grading Service, I am proud to say that it's an above average quality coin. It came in at MS-63 (uncirculated coins grade from 60 to 70). From what I understand, there is only one MS-67 ever graded by PCGS (one of many coin grading outfits), but there are quite a few that are MS-60 through MS-65.

The values of this particular coin moves up quickly with each grade level increase. Here are the latest estimates from the PCGS guide.

MS-62 $490
MS-63 $700
MS-64 $1,200
MS-65 $4,000
MS-66 $14,500

Too bad the grader didn't give me a 64 rating... now that would have been sweet.

Here are some pics I took of the coin. It really is a pretty coin. The more I look at it, the more I want to get back into collecting again.

Johnson Matthey Silver Bar

I bought a single Johnson Matthey silver bar today to add to my small, but hopefully growing, stash of bullion (almost entirely in the form of Gold and Silver Eagles). I was able to lock in when silver was at $14.85. I paid 0.79 over spot, which seems to be pretty good.

This is the first bar of any kind that I've bought, so I'm looking forward to seeing it in person. It will probably get to me in a couple of weeks, as I opted to pay with a personal check to avoid the extra charge when using credit card. In any case, I'll probably post a picture of it once I receive it.

Silver Quarter

Most of you probably don't know that I used to collect coins. I have a decent collection despite not being really into the hobby for quite a while. I still buy a few coins from time to time whenever the collecting bug rears its head.

One thing that I picked up as part of my numismatic interest was looking through my change, because you never know what you'll find. The usual good stuff I'd find would be include wheat pennies and the occasional war nickel that is 35% silver (you can tell by a giant mint mark above the Monticello building).

Anyway, while looking through the change I received from yesterday's purchase of lunch, I saw that one of the quarters gleamed a bit differently. Upon closer inspection, it happens that I found a (90%) silver quarter from 1964. I think it's only the 3rd time that I've ever found a silver quarter in my life. It really is quite rare, especially given that they look very different than other quarters. They stopped making silver quarters for normal circulation in 1964, so it has had to escape collection for a good 45 years... pretty impressive.

Here's a picture with flash of the silver quarter mixed in with some regular quarters. It is painfully obvious which one is not like the others.


And, even if you don't get a good look at the actual obverse or reverse of the coin, you can tell which one is silver simply by looking at the ridged edges.


Also, they clink differently due to the different metal content. But, you'll just have to trust me on that one, since I am not so ambitious as to record quarter clinking sounds.

Well, here's the coin itself. That's one less silver quarter for the world to find in their change. I really wonder how many are still out there floating in normal circulation. So, keep your eyes out for silver quarters and dimes from 1964 and earlier. And, for half dollars (if you ever come across any) that are dated 1969 or before... technically, 1970 halves exist, but they were never released for normal circulation and can only be found inside collector sets.


On a final note, I should say that it's not worth that much... maybe a couple dollars.