1820 25C Small 0 MS(PCGS#5328)

Summer 2025 Global Showcase Auction U.S. Coins

Auctioneer

Stack's Bowers

Lot Number

4273

Grade

VF25

Price

1,260

Lot Description

Tompkins Die Stage 1/1, Rea et al. Die State P. <strong>Breen-Browning Plate Coin</strong>. Steel-olive patina in the fields gives way to lighter silver gray on the devices for this pleasing circulated cameo Bust quarter. A tiny pit in the reverse field before the eagle's beak is the only blemish of note on otherwise smooth-looking surfaces. Suitably bold overall for the assigned grade, although the reverse is struck trivially off center to 1 o'clock with thin, weak denticulation along the upper right border.<p>This is the rarest die pairing of the 1820-dated quarter issue, its obverse shared with B-4, the other Small 0 attribution. The reverse of the 1820 Browning-5 is shared with the 1820 B-2 and 1821 B-4, and this variety was actually struck in the latter year, after the earliest (read: perfect) die stage of the 1821 B-4. With a known census comprised of mostly well worn coins, it is little wonder that the offered example is included the 2008 Tompkins Condition Census, as CC#6.<p><strong>Steve M. Tompkins Commentary:</strong> As with the 1805 B-5 offered earlier in the sale, I chose this coin as my set piece due to it being a plate coin for the 1992 Breen update of Browning.