What do you learned scholars of US coins think about this half cent? It's ANACS AU58 Details, Rim Damage. I see some depressions in the rim at 2 and 9 on the obverse and 9 on the reverse. Do you agree with AU58 otherwise? And what would you offer for the coin? Much obliged.
Make it 1500 and I'm in! I put together a US type set many years ago, and I'm toying with the idea of doing it again, this time with better knowledge and a little more scratch. Being a collector of ancients, I'm not the least bit bothered by "details" grades - heck, every coin in my gallery gets a details grade - as long as the coins have decent eye-appeal and I'm not paying a premium for an overgraded piece.
It's tough to separate out high AU from MS without having the coin in hand to look for luster breaks. If there are significant luster breaks than AU seems appropriate. Either way, low MS would net to high AU with those rim dings in my mind. To the extent that I collect late date half cents I look for MS examples, they never really circulated so there are plenty of very nice examples out there. I just would not buy with a problem coin from this date range.
Thanks beef. I did a little more hunting after I read your post, and I see that you are correct. There seem to be plenty of problem-free coins in this series, in the AU range, and not terribly more expensive than the coin I posted.
Intercept Shield album, which is why I'm not looking for the highest-grade coins in top-tier TPG slabs. I want attractive raw coins, or coins that aren't going to be hugely devalued by cracking them out.
Also, is there any substantial risk of encountering counterfeits in this series - specifically the Braided Hair Half Cents?
Not that I'm aware of, at least not for the business strike common stuff. The proof coins may have some fakes as well as the earlier half cent, i.e. 1796. I think you will generally be safe looking for AU raw coins, just be careful with the color/surface condition. It's an aside, but I just picked up the Frankenfield auction catalog of early copper sold in 2001, he bought two 1796's from the Cohen sale, the same Cohen who wrote the book on the series, and both turned out after the sale to be counterfeit elctrotypes.
JR bought the coins for real 1796 prices and sold them with his collection as electrotypes, so no he did not have any recourse that I am aware off. They were such good fakes they fooled Cohen, the cataloger, and other experts in the half cent community.
I haven't seen too many good Chinese counterfeits from the late style half or large cents. And honestly, I have not seen many of them. They are out there, but I think they are pretty crude and pretty infrequently offered on ebay, but ymmv
