Heritage Dallas Coin Auction Offers Comparison in Coin Collecting Styles

By CoinLink on Monday, October 19, 2009
Filed Under: Auction News, Commentary and Opinion, Featured, General Collecting, Heritage Auction Galleries

Heritage’s upcoming 2009 October Signature US Coin Auction, taking place at the Dallas headquarters of Heritage on October 22-24, presents an interesting opportunity to look at the contrasts of Collecting styles between two of the Featured Collections.

1920-S_10_101909 The Mulkin Collection is an impressive offering of 142 lots made up of Territorial gold, early gold Federal issues, and gold rarities of the nineteenth century. After graduating from the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, Jim Ed Mulkin entered the U.S. Air Force and served in the Korean Conflict. He then returned to his hometown in Alabama where he used his mustering-out pay to start his own business. His love of history and the appeal of numismatics soon led him to begin collecting. “When I had a little extra money,” said Mulkin, “coins were what I invested in.”

The coins in the Mulkin Collection were purchased largely in the 1960s and 1970s from well-known dealers, and out of major collections with impressive pedigrees. Most have been off the market for almost forty years, however many have been improperly cleaned and are housed in NCS holders.

No doubt that grading standards have changed over the years, and althought the collection contains many beautiful coins, the impression I got in viewing the lots online, was of a collector who valued quanity over quality. Do not misunderstand this comment, many of the Mulkin coins are rare and offer excellant opportunities for Territorial and Early Gold collectors to pick up impressive coins, but taken as a “collection”, we stand by our previous comments.

For Example, there are 10 Bechtler Territorial Gold coins, covering Gold Dollars $2.50 AND $5.00 Peices. All are NSC graded and imparied in one way or another. Now ANY Bechtler gold coin is important, however the collector has well over $30,000 of value in these coins. Would he have been better off, at leat monitarally, to have sold off these ten coins and just purchase one original and exceptional coin?

By contrast, Take a look at the Little Rock Collection in the same Heritage sale. It is an impressive collection, yet few in number, containing a mere seven coins. But what coins!

Starting out the collection is a trio of tempting Saint-Gaudens $10 coins. Leading off is a Wire Rim 1907 eagle graded MS64 by NGC. The Wire Rim eagles may be considered an analogue to the famous High Relief Saint-Gaudens double eagles, in that they are the first issue in the series that can be collected by more than, say, a dozen numismatists. Only 500 Wire Rim tens were struck, and examples this nice don’t come up for auction every month. Two late rare date San Francisco issues finish off the tens.

The rest of the coins are Liberty double eagles. First is an 1871-CC double eagle graded AU55 by NGC. Early Carson City gold is a longtime collector favorite, and that interest is almost certain to carry over for this AU55 coin — AU55 is an excellent grade by the 1871-CC double eagle standards. The overall “THEME” of the collection are coins of low-mintage and high-desirability and quality.

There is no right or wrong way to collect coins. Each coin comes with its own history and depending upon the collectors interests and budget, they acquire coins over decades, often changing focus and interests as time goes by. However I do think these two collections offer a contrast in collecting styles that is worth pointing out. Wich collection do you think will do better in terms in auction results, and does it matter?