I'm sure other people here have bought from/follow M.Barr coins on eBay/Facebook, but they posted something really cool I wanted to share before heading out to the lake today. Quoting their post: "The finest known 1792 silver Half Disme, once in possession of then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and personally owned by the first United States Mint Director David Rittenhouse, has been sold for a record $1,985,000 by Classic Coin Company of Bridgewater, New Jersey. The Half Dismes were the first coins struck under the authority of the 1788 United States Constitution, and the first struck by authority of Congress under the April 1792 Mint Act." Maybe if i hit the lotto I'll have to grab it lol
Probably three-quarters of the 1792 half dismes were owned by Jefferson at some point. The latest research showed that Jefferson had $75 worth of Spanish dollars turned into 1,500 half dimes before he set out of Monticello in July 1792. The coins were made at the shop of artisan John Harper in Philadelphia under Jefferson’s supervision. He handed out part or all of them as tips on his journey to Virginia. In the fall, the first mint received the dies and made perhaps as many as 500 more. Those coins have rust spots (late date state) which can be used to distinguish them from the earlier pieces. The price of these coins has gone way up over the last 30 + years. I bought an NGC VF-30 in the early 1990s. I paid a high four figure price for it. Today it’s priced in the upper end of 5 figures. There are an estimated 300 to 325 survivors. Many of them are damaged or heavily worn. Even the not so nice ones are expensive.
Just learned another thing and happy for it! In terms of price point vs condition, it's a very similar story with the Fugio Cent (which I also want but am in no rush to get one)
This makes my mouth water..... Talk about touching real history..... But the debate still rages... Is it pronounced "deem" or "diz-me"?
About 40 years ago the finest known example of this coin came up in an auction. In those days everything was catalogs, no Internet. For a nanosecond I thought, “if I sold my whole collection, could I buy this coin? I figured that it would sell for about $100 thousand. There were no buyers’ fees in those days. As it turned out, I was right. The published price realized was about $100 thousand. Later I learned that it was good that I didn’t sell my collection. The coin actually did not sell. The consigner bought it in.
Interesting. I live in Bridgewater, NJ and have never heard of this company. They don't have a physical address listed. Just a PO. Is this just a one guy operation? I wonder what type of documentation was provided to the buyer. Address: P.O. Box 6463 Bridgewater, New Jersey, 08807 United States of America Contact: Brian Hendelson Phone: 908-725-5600 Fax: 908-725-2600
