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Sale 4
Lot 1904
1883 $10 Liberty. ANACS graded Proof 55. A Proof which got into a bag of other coins, somehow, for it's loaded with bagmarks which becloud the mirrors' depth. But this piece was never circulated ("55" tends to suggest that, but in Proofs it means Impaired). Of course no perfectionist will bid on this coin, that's their nature. But lots of coin enthusiasts will be delighted by it. Just 40 Proof tens were made this year. PCGS has graded 2 of them (both as PR64). NGC has seen 2 as well (also PR64). Maybe that represents just 2 coins total? Whether 2 or 4, that's a tiny number to have turned up, isn't it? Put into that kind of perspective, maybe this one is worth some serious attention. The cataloguer can tell you this much. For all the splendid coins he has catalogued over 25 years, he likes this coin. The abrasions are all from other coins. There is no man-produced cleaning of any kind. The Proof fire still blazes, right through all those marks, even if the "deep pool" effect supposed to be created by those Proof fields is no longer present. It's true that this coin is best enjoyed in natural light, rather than through a glass under 100 watts of beam. But that's how it was meant to be viewed back in 1883--remember, there would not be electric lights in American homes for another two decades.
It was only on September 4, 1882, that inventor Thomas A. Edison first supplied electricity to our biggest city, Manhattan. His Pearl Street "central station" created steam-generated power which he sent out to the city's streetlights via a system of pole-carried wires, which only appeared on a few major streets in 1882. The throngs of immigrants down in the boroughs of Queens and Brooklyn remained in the dark a while longer. As in recent years, floods along the Ohio River caused plenty of damage. New York millionaire William Vanderbilt (grandson of the "Commodore" who thought the public should "be damned") spent a quarter-million dollars on one elegant party for twelve hundred guests--thereby beginning an extravagant lifestyle which continues to this day--only now, it's dot-com billionaires. Perhaps this 1883 golden eagle jingled in Lady Astor's purse or gown pocket! Or perhaps it was the "flip coin" for New York's very first Horse Show, held on October 22nd of 1883. We will never know, and its history will remain locked up forever beneath those bagmarks, somewhere deep in the clouded mirrors of this still-glittering symbol of the ultimate American "culture"--money!.
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| Realized $2,530 |
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