I'm not collecting any particular pre-Federal or Colonial series at the moment but rather adding these coins to my US Type Set. But I also don't buy a PF or COL until I've bought enough reference materials to help me understand what I'm doing. Anyway, here's some selections of PF and COL. I won't include Fugio since it's now considered an authorized US issue. Also not included is my Spanish silver. The uncut pair of 1788 $5/$7 Continental Currency really grabbed me at a show. I didn't haggle with the dealer, just paid his ask, which was not unreasonable. Last night I bid on a Mass half cent in the EAC Auction but lost. Also lost on a Talbot, Allum & Lee token. One of the highlights I watched was someone going to a $28,000 hammer of a 1795 Jefferson Head S-80 large cent, raw, sharpness VF20, EAC Net VG8.
So Jack, this Vt. Baby Head appeared in in an old thread (2018) onthe CU forums, started by Insider, about electrotypes. https://forums.collectors.com/discu...-detailed-the-deceptive-old-electrotypes-were So, ummm, is this an electrotype that NGC slabbed as a genuine AU58? Or am I simply confused, which has been known to happen, on occasion. (?)
I purchased the Baby Head as an electro a few years ago; in that time I could NOT find an actual source coin for it, and XRF and weight do not support it as an electro either. Several of my Colonial experts began questioning if it wasn't genuine and I sent it to NGC where it slabbed. I continue to review it with experts but consensus so far is it is good...
@Collecting Nut "To Counterfeit is DEATH"; I think they meant it back then--not so much nowadays with all the counterfeit coins and other items being produced!
It may have said that “counterfeiting is death,” but I think that must have applied to paper money. Given the number of counterfeit coins that were made during that era, the enforcement must have been quite lax. A prime example was the Machen Mills Company which made real coins during the day and counterfeit pieces at night.m
@johnmilton yes I agree that there were contemporary counterfeits made, both coinage and script, however, there was no "official" federally-issued paper money until 1862, only script, and local or state bank issued notes. As for coins, there was the recently designated "first official coin", the Fugio Cent of 1787, but that was not promoted by congress as such and so it was the 1792 Half Disme that was generally considered the first official coinage of the U.S. and therefore, the following paragraph would not have applied to federal coinage, but may have applied to Colonial Coinage and foreign circulating coins within the colonies (which were legal tender until 1857). It should be noted that Congress desired to severely punish anyone that would attempt to defraud, this is evident via the following citation from the "First Congress Session II Chapters 8, 9 Section 14" and this Statute remains in force to this day (various authors have referenced this in their publications), but has never been enforced by penalty of death: "SEC. 14. And be it [further] enacted, That if any person or persons shall falsely make, alter, forge or counterfeit, or cause or procure to be falsely made, altered, forged, or counterfeited, or willingly act or assist in the false making, altering, forging or counterfeiting any certificate, indent, or other public security of the United States, or shall utter, put off, or offer, or cause to be uttered, put off, or offered in payment or for sale any such false, forged, altered or counterfeited certificate, indent or other public security, with intention to defraud any person, knowing the same to be false, -altered, forged or counterfeited, and shall be thereof convicted, every such person shall suffer death.(6)"