Some 3 years ago I decided to work (slowly) on a date series set of France 1 Franc Sowers (semeuse in French) from 1898-1920. The design is one that I have long counted among my favorites of modern world coins. Beyond the design of this series, I am a fan of the artistry of Louis-Oscar Roty in general. It helps that I share the same birthday with Roty (June 11th), but I was also fascinated by his influence on Victor David Brenner (of Lincoln Cent fame), and the eventual importance of the Sower in influencing the design of the US Walking Liberty Half dollar (another one of my favorite designs). The silver 1 Franc coin was issued each year from 1898 through 1920. The "keys" of the set are 1900, 1903, and the 1914-C; each with relatively small mintages and quite difficult (and pricey) in MS grades. My set is still small, but this week I was very pleased to add a matte proof 1 Franc from 1898 to my growing set (proofs were struck only for years 1898 and 1900). It is a nice juxtaposition with my regular strike 1898 coin. I have been very picky about coins I acquire for this set, so that makes the progress even slower...but I'm going for a particular "look" to the set and I'm in no hurry. Thanks for looking, and if you have any Sowers please post them here! I can't get enough of the design! Regards, Brandon
Can't stop drooling over those epic toners... man those are some fine pieces ya' got thar. I have started to like these coins myself recently.
Beautiful set, Brandon. I too am a big fan of Roty's work. I opted not to bid on that matte proof, but happy to see it show up here on CT!
Gorgeous coins! It's one of my favorite designs as well, and I've bought and sold a large number of the various denominations raw. Here are a few of the ones I've imaged:
WOW!!! All I can tell you is that you are doing a GREAT job on your Franc Set. The epic toners in your set are amazing and you should be very proud of you have accomplished in a short time. Just about nothing beats that feeling when you open up your coin books and look at your Franc set and grin from ear to ear in satisfaction. Congratulations on a job well done.
Congrats on a great looking set of coins! I always liked this design since seeing my first one as a kid.Best of luck filling out the rest of them and HH.....
To my eye, the sower is hands-down the most beautiful coin design ever. Even the modern base metal versions are nice.
Two nice examples showed up on eBay from a French dealer in February. I have added the 1915 and 1917 to my set now, both with the look that I am going for. Slow and steady...
Yes, the Semeuse was a stunning late 19th century design. The modern circulation coinage version I do not find that appealing. Then again, the sower was also used for the "Semeuse Cinétique" series - several gold and silver coins issued at face that, when you put them in a row, show a sower in motion, sort of. The old sower is still used on some other collector coins; see this new one for example. Christian
I love the 50c, 1F, and 2F coins, but I wanted to focus on one denomination. Thus, for my date set I'm doing only 1 Franc coins.
These seem to come onto the market in "waves" as I was also able to pick up a lovely 1912 last week, and it arrived today. Below are my images of it. It has some lovely original gold and green tones to it.
