1822 50C O-103 MS(PCGS#39587)

1822 50C O-103 MS (PCGS#39587)

February 2021 Mail Bid Auction 51

Losbeschreibung: Near Condition Census. The finest is a Gem Proof, ex Norweb. It brought $211,500 in the September 2015 Stack’s/Bowers-Sotheby sale of the Pogue Collection. This lightly circulated example is an intermediate die state. A thin die break crosses star 6 to the bridge of Liberty’s nose. The later-appearing break at the top of the date to drapery and star 13, required of the O.103a die state, is absent. The coin bespeaks originality. Its smooth, lustrous surfaces donned a crust of antique woodgrain toning. Henry Hilgard cherried the coin sometime in the 1980’s. He sold or traded it to Gehring Prouty a few years later. The next owner was Tim Osborne, Gehring’s soulmate and closest friend among BHNC members. Tim wrote the following when I told him the coin was coming to auction:I could never get Gehring to sell me any of his dupes – he just kept them all. But in October 1996 he finally let this one go. It was raw when I bought it, so I sent it to NGC. It came back AU 58. Later, in June 2013, I crossed it to PCGS as AU 55. [The NGC AU 58 label accompanies the lot.] Tim and Dr. Tom Sears got together in 2019 to discuss a series of numismatic transactions. Tom came away with this remarkable coin. The slab photo was taken before it acquired a CAC sticker. Estimate: $3,800 to $4,500