1836 50C GR-1 Reeded Edge MS(PCGS#531046)

November 2025 Showcase Auction U.S. Coins

Auctioneer

Stack's Bowers

Lot Number

8223

Grade

AU58

Price

6,000

Lot Description

A highly desirable example of this iconic issue. Both sides are essentially untoned with a pleasing steel-silver appearance, almost as if it had been recently struck. Much frosty luster remains on surfaces that present as smooth and virtually distraction-free during in-hand viewing.<p><p>Though Walter Breen divined a mintage figure of 1,200+ circulation strikes for the 1836 Reeded Edge half dollar decades ago, the true figure is undoubtedly several thousand coins higher. Given the population of surviving 1836 Reeded Edge half dollars today, Robert W. Julian has estimated that the mintage was actually closer to 5,000 pieces. Between the legendarily elusive Small Eagle half dollars of 1796 and 1797 and the scarce Philadelphia Mint dates between 1879 and 1890, no other half dollar issue approaches the low mintage of the 1836 Reeded Edge. Beyond its evident historical importance, the 1836 Reeded Edge has always been admired as a rarity. For most of the 19th century, this issue was deemed a pattern, too rare to have been issued for circulation. While listed in J. Hewitt Judd's United States Pattern, Trial, and Experimental Pieces as Judd-57, a listing that remains in modern editions out of a sense of tradition, the 1836 Reeded Edge half dollar is now acknowledged as a regular issue coin. The vast majority of survivors show significant wear; near-Mint survivors such as this very scarce and always in demand.