One of Only Two Known

Heritage will be offering one of only two known 1915 P50C Panama-Pacific Half Dollars struck in Gold (Judd-1960 PR64 NGC) during the Boston ANA Signature Sale in August Lot # 13007.

The design is the same as the regular-issue 1915-S Panama-Pacific commemorative half, but lacking the normal S mintmark. Struck in gold with a reeded edge. Other S-less Panama-Pacific half dollar patterns are also known in silver and copper. These extremely rare patterns were clearly clandestine strikes, produced at the Philadelphia Mint before mintmark punches were applied to the working dies. There are two known examples of the gold half dollar, both struck on cut-down, struck Saint-Gaudens double eagle coins. Similar examples are known of the 1915 Panama-Pacific gold dollar and of the round and octagonal fifty dollar pieces, all lacking the S mintmark. The website USPatterns.com comments of the pieces, “These could be die trials but it seems that they were really struck for profit.”

Pollock comments in his United States Patterns and Related Issues:

“Farran Zerbe, who was involved in the coining and distribution of the Panama-Pacific commemoratives in California, has been quoted by Walter Breen as saying that specimens ‘may have been struck as trial pieces at the Philadelphia Mint by the instructions of the Secretary of the Treasury, who was a coin collector.’ The Secretary of the Treasury at the time was W.G. McAdoo of New York, a name familiar to students of U.S. paper money.”

Anthony Swiatek, in his Commemorative Coins of the United States (2001), writes much more unequivocally concerning the 1915 Pan-Pac half dollar, “Extremely rare trial pieces, made at the Philadelphia Mint, were struck without the S Mint mark. Two were created in gold, six in silver and four in copper for Treasury Secretary William Gibbs McAdoo–a coin collector!”

Further along, Pollock records his notes on the present specimen:

“Careful examination of the Farouk-Norweb coin [the present coin, listed as No. 2 in the Census below] reveals planchet file marks and traces of an undertype, indicating that the half dollar dies were impressed on a cut-down $20 gold coin, which had been filed to remove high-relief details. This piece is remarkably thick: 2.4 mm at the edge versus 2.1 mm for a regular-issue Panama-Pacific half dollar.

“The characteristics of the coin suggest that it was made clandestinely. Since the piece is overstruck instead of being made using a new planchet of normal thickness, it can be inferred that there was a desire on the part of the manufacturer that no mention of the piece be made in the bullion account books, and thus it may have been produced secretly at the Mint in the same manner as the 1913 Liberty nickel or the Class III 1804 dollar. The only other known example of the variety [listed as No. 1 below] is reportedly also struck over a cut-down $20 gold piece.” (more…)

The Vienna auction house Dorotheum has sold the world’s largest gold coin, a Canadian Maple Leaf manufactured by the Royal Canadian Mint in 2007. It is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records and carries a face value of one million Canadian dollars (800,000 euros, 970,000 US dollars) measuring 53 centimetres (21 inches) in diameter and weighing 100 kilograms (220 pounds).

According to the Wall Street Journal,The coin was sold as part of the liquidation of the assets of bankrupt Austrian investment firm AvW Group, founded by Wolfgang Auer von Welsbach, the great-grandson of a 19th century Austrian nobleman and industrialist who invented the lighter flint and gas mantle.

Mr. von Welsbach is in police custody and faces possible charges of embezzlement and fraud in connection with the company’s collapse.

AvW had acquired the coin in 2007, joining an exclusive club of owners including Queen Elizabeth, who is also displayed on one side of the coin, two unidentified investors in Dubai and one who is so reclusive even his or her residence is unknown.

The bidding started at 3.27 million euros, with Oro Direct, a Spanish gold-trading firm being the lone bidder. It is reported that up to 8 different bidders had registered but no counter bids were made. The auction room was packed with more journalists than potential buyers.

The auction price disappointed Michael Beckers, Dorotheum’s coin expert who oversaw the sale. He had predicted that the price could go as high as €4 million “on a good day”.

“I’m a little disappointed. I had hoped and expected to achieve more,” he said, minutes after the hammer fell.

The Royal Canadian Mint manufactured and launched the coin in 2007 to showcase its production facilities and steal the entry in the Guinness Book of Records for the world’s biggest gold coin.

That title had previously been held by the Austrian mint, who in 2004 produced fifteen 100,000-euro coins weighing 1,000 troy ounces (31.1 kg) to celebrate the 15th anniversary of its best-selling Philharmonics coin.

Valencia-based Oro Direct’s managing director Michael Berger said his firm intends to use the coin in its marketing efforts, .

“We believe in gold, and therefore also believe we have made a great investment. We believe that going forward, gold will offer the only real safe haven in this uncertain economic environment,”

Exhibit Includes Treasures from 1857 SS Central America Shipwreck

The incredible “Ship of Gold” exhibit, showcasing California Gold Rush-era sunken treasure recovered from the 1857 shipwreck of the SS Central America, will make port in Boston at the American Numismatic Association’s World’s Fair of Money, August 10-14 at the Hynes Convention Center. The exhibit is courtesy of Monaco Rare Coins of Newport Beach, Calif.

The SS Central America was recovered in 1988 from nearly 8,000 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. The ship sank in a hurricane in September 1857 while carrying California gold from Panama to New York City.

“There will be examples of historic assayers’ ingots as well as San Francisco Mint and California territorial gold coins with a combined value of over $10 million,” said Adam Crum, vice president of Monaco. “One of the highlights is a huge Kellogg & Humbert ingot. Weighing just over 55 troy pounds, it is the largest surviving gold ingot of the California Gold Rush.”

The exhibit also includes one of the 13 recovered octagonal $50 gold pieces produced by the United States Assay Office of San Francisco, and the remains of a wooden cargo box that still contains approximately 110 Double Eagles as they were found on the ocean floor. Many appear to be 1857-S $20 gold pieces, apparently freshly struck at the San Francisco Mint when they were placed in the container for shipping.

Visitors will see the front pages of three 1857 newspapers that published stories about the shipwreck, the ordeal of survivors and the devastating economic effects created by the loss of the gold. Robert Evans, the chief scientist on the 1980s mission by the Columbus-America Discovery Group that located and recovered the magnificent sunken treasure, will be in Boston to meet visitors and discuss the SS Central America, her cargo, crew and passengers.

The Ship of Gold display was first publicly presented in February 2000. Over the years it has been seen by more than one million people in exhibitions at several venues and cities across the country.

[Adam Crum of Monaco Rare Coins Gives a  Tour of the Exhibit - Originally Filmed on Long Beach
Video Courtesy of CoinTelevision.com]

The ANA World’s Fair of Money is the nation’s premiere money show. Show hours are 1-5:30 p.m. August 10, and 9:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. August 11-14. Dealer set-up is from 8 a.m.-
1 p.m. Tuesday, August 10. Admission is $6 for adults, and free for ANA members and children 12 and under. For more information on all of the show highlights, call 719-482-9857 or visit www.worldsfairofmoney.com.