A friend of mine recently sold me his bust half collection. As expected, most were problem coins, but there were 20 that I picked out that struck me as particularly beautiful and interesting. I just thought I'd show them here. This is the coin that got me hooked as a young man. They are beautiful, aren't they? So many overdates and varieties!
Some nice coin varieties...I especially like the 1813 50/UNI, the 17/3, the 23 ugly 3, (the broken and patched examples are nice as well) and (for me, of course) the 27/6.
Oh, snap! Those are lovely! I'm looking for a Draped Bust half with that nice contrasting "CircCam" appearance you can see on the 1813 and the second 1823 above.
Amen to that. Is it a bit overwhelming to get a collection like this in one shot? I love it when people post multiple photos that you actually have to scroll through. Very nice.
That's a fine looking group of halves. It shows the wide variety of surface appearances that old circ silver can have. Fun to scroll through.
The collection had 62 raw coins. He kept the slabbed ones. I picked the best 20 to post here. There was a 1839-O in there but it's been scratched and damaged beyond belief. Of course no 1815/2, which is a $3k-5k coin. It's an expensive endeavor, but it's always gratifying to fill up an album.
They really are both beautiful series of coins, I just wish they weren't so damn expensive! Some great examples posted here, good luck finding nice homes for them (if they're not staying in your home).
How many in the set? I see the 1815 is missing. I think there are over 400 varieties. I had a friend that had 396 of the varieties and yes, many are problem coins. He passed away on a trip to Mexico a few years ago and the coins reside with his family still as far as I know.