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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;MIGuy, post: 25093925, member: 116145&quot;]Well, Poor + Damaged is poorer than Poor, of course!&nbsp; Now here&#039;s a very very poor example of a coin that I find very interesting - the 1794 Half Cent - 81,600 Minted, PCGS estimates about 2500 survivors!&nbsp; (From rarecoinwholesalers.com)&nbsp; The Coinage Act of April 2, 1792 authorized the Mint and prescribed the standards for the new federal decimal coinage. The smallest denomination provided for in the law was the copper half cent, first struck in July 1793, just four months after the Chain cent appeared. Equal to 1/200th of a dollar, the half cent had more spending power than many modern Americans realize. A dollar in 1793 was a respectable amount of money, although no U. S. dollar coins would be struck for another year.</p><p><br /></p><p>Instead, the new copper cents and half cents would be fractions of the Spanish milled dollar or Piece of Eight, the hefty silver coin struck in both Spanish and Latin American mints. Widely used throughout the Western Hemisphere, the Spanish coins were very familiar to Americans and served as the basis for the U.S. silver dollar coin issued in 1794. Since the Spanish fractional one real or bit was equal to 12-1/2 cents in decimal coinage, a half cent was necessary for making honest change. Few Americans living away from the Atlantic seaboard, however, actually handled many of these “Little Half Sisters,” as copper coinage student Dr. Warren A. Lapp nicknamed the denomination.</p><p><br /></p><p>Although half cents were issued for more than 60 years, they remained America’s unwanted coins. They proved to be of little use, circulated grudgingly if at all, and were often kept in dead storage at the Mint waiting for infrequent orders from the infant nation’s banks. Production—sometimes for several years—was often interrupted by shortages of copper and lack of demand. This small denomination may have suffered from identification with the poorest classes; they were supposed to be its biggest users, at least according to Robert Morris, the Revolutionary War financier and one of the architects of the U. S. coinage system. Morris subscribed to the age-old but misguided view that smaller denominations brought lower prices, allowing the poor to purchase more with their money. Unfortunately, not only did the public have little use for half cents, but for generations collectors also ignored the little copper coins. Only recently has a birth of interest been sparked, with the publication of new definitive works in the mid- 1980s: American Half Cents, the “Little Half Sisters” by Roger Cohen and Walter Breen’s Encyclopedia of United States Half Cents have attracted many new devotees to this long overlooked denomination.</p><p><br /></p><p>1794 was the second year the half cent was issued.&nbsp; The 1794 Half Cent is a modified version of the 1793 Liberty Cap Half Cent, with the head of Liberty turned so she is facing right. There are two major sub-types for this year: Low-relief Head and High-Relief Head. Large and Small Letter edge variants appear only on the Low Relief Heads; rarity depends on the variety with which it appears (PCGS).&nbsp; The 1794 is more common than the 1793 half cent (mintage around 35,000) but there aren&#039;t a lot of either of these around today.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]1602606[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1602607[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1602608[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1602609[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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