It's true! I checked all 36 VAMs listed in the 2006 Cherrypickers Guide AND all 75 Official VAMs at VAM World. This is the second silver dollar I have researched, the first being 2 years ago, a 1921 Philly. That one was a lot easier, and I came up with VAM 1 for it. Here is the second: As you can see, seen some miles...I pegged it at XF40. It is a Far Date, Round O. I didn't see any other attributes. The dates' 1 lines up with the end of the 3rd denticle to the right of the point of the bust. The normal position is 2 1/2 denticles, and the Very Far Date is pushed over to 3 1/2 denticles. Lastly, above, shows the Round O (as opposed to Oval) with a wide aperture. I set aside other projects over the last 2 days to research this one, I have many others (but I will only post the most interesting ones, I promise). Really had a blast VAMming out this dollar. I hope you all enjoy it...Spark
It looks like VAM 27 is a reasonable attribution for this. There is too much wear to be able to see anything other than the date position and mint mark style. A few things to notice and learn from: 1. The mint mark position doesn't match the picture shown on VW. 2. Pictures not supplied by Leroy Van Allen are not necessarily correct, although the mint mark position on the coin shown is still in the normal position. 3. The specification not specifying a mint mark position implies it is in the normal position, which you can see defined on VW's "Attribution 101" page. 4. This VAM states that multiple die pairs may exist, which happens where there is a somewhat generic description such as that for VAM 27, but several dies may fit that description. 5. You need to look at pcgs.com/photograde and brush up on grading Morgan dollars. This coin has the details of a F15, not XF40.
@messydesk ...your info is gratefully accepted. This is why I am here, to learn and get better. I will study the grading resource you mentioned...Thanks for your knowledge and willingness to share...Spark
Follow-up...I checked out Photograde...boy! I was way off...I should have consulted there before posting. F15 is good from 2 sources. Anyone know of pop reports for VAM 27? How many exist and is there any way to really know?…Spark
Very hard to know. It's not a VAM that people are really looking for, so we don't know how hard it is to find compared with others.
