Q. David Bowers
The Value of Detailed Explanations
It may be that in the explanation of data gathering and evaluation, and rarity determination, I am going into too much detail. However, I feel that readers truly interested in the subject will appreciate knowing how the figures were derived, and what their reliability is. (Those who are not should just skip this section of the book!)
In the course of working with many numismatic reference books in many different series over a long period of years, I have always found it frustrating when an author stated, for example, that a variety is common, when in my own experience I have seen very few; or, if someone wrote that a coin is one of two known, and I have bought and sold five different. Accordingly, by explaining in detail the derivation of an estimate, readers will know as much as I do, and can more clearly evaluate the rarity aspect of a given coin.
It is dramatically evident that much information presently in print concerning mintages and rarity ratings is patently incorrect. Much of the rarity information in the present book represents new information based upon methods and a depth of research not hitherto employed in the early dollar series.
However, due credit is given to the excellent studies conducted by others in the past, as we all build on the efforts of our predecessors. When Bolender published his first rarity ratings in 1950, he was a committee of one. From this beginning, much has developed. It would be hard to envision a world of early dollars without the work of Milferd H. Bolender looming large over it. Likewise, the ghost of Capt. John W. Haseltine still lurks in the shadows.
Similarly, the present work will be a jumping-off spot for additional research. If interest in early dollars expands, then doubtless many presently unattributed coins will be classified, and rarity ratings will have to be revised once again. If NGC and PCGS start attributing the early dollars that pass through their hands, this will be very helpful to those who study the subject in the future. The study of die states will undoubtedly necessitate some revisions of die linkages and minting periods.
Revised Mintage Figures
It is popular with numismatists to use published mintage figures as a guide to rarity. However, I suggest that in the field of early silver dollars, official figures are of relatively little use in this regard.
Each year the Mint kept production records of coins minted, and each year the Treasury Department made the numbers available in annual reports to the public. According to these figures, the following quantities of silver dollars were struck during the calendar years indicated:
1794: 1,758
1795: 203,033
1796: 72,290
1797: 7,776
1798: 327,536
1799: 423,515
1800: 220,920
1801:54,454
1802: 41,650
1803: 85,6341(85,634 includes 19,570 struck in calendar year 1804 from earlier dated dies.)
Total: 1,438,566
These are the figures that are published in the Guide Book and other standard references. I have no quarrel at all with the total of these numbers, and believe that during the time span in question, silver dollars totaling 1,438,566 coins were struck. Further, I am sure that 1,758 silver dollars must have been struck in calendar year 1794, 203,033 in calendar year 1795, and so on. However, Ido have a problem with the assumption that the calendar year mintage figures equate to the dates actually struck on the coins.
For example, on the market today, the 1797 dollar is only slightly scarcer than the 1796 dollar. There is little difference in market prices between the two dates. Thus, it is not reasonable to assume that the mintage of 1797-dated dollars was only 7,776. It must have been more (or else the mintage of 1796-dated dollars must have been less than the government number). It seems to me that the original mintage of 1796--dated dollars and 1797-dated dollars must have been about the same.
As Dr. Robert Stark has suggested, (Letter to the author, January 1, 1993) it is possible in view of the belief that large quantities of dollars were exported-that as the Mint struck silver dollars to order for bullion depositors, an exporter may have deposited a quantity of foreign coins or bullion, and received new dollars. The freshly coined dollars, perhaps consisting of much or most of the production of a given die variety, could have been exported, never to enter domestic circulation, and to be lost to present-day numismatists.
In the early years it was Mint practice to keep using dies until they ware out or broke.(This policy was followed for a long time. For example, in 1827 an obverse die for the quarter dollar was made by overpunching an 1823-dated die still on hand but not used earlier. Circa 1798, the Mint used a 1795 half eagle obverse to strike coins with the Heraldic Eagle reverse (which had not been devised by 1795, thus creating a design oddity).) Thus, if the Mint had made up a quantity of 1797-dated dies in anticipation of a large coinage that year, but if silver deposits were insufficient, or there were other problems, and if only a few coins were minted, the 'serviceable dies still on hand at the end of the year would be used the following year. I believe that this happened in the majority of instances.
Of course, the Mint never stated that its production figures for early silver dollars referred to the dates actually on the coins. Numismatists have just assumed that they did. In Appendix II the situation is explored in depth. The Economite hoard (1878) and data from NGC and PCGS population reports are used to suggest revisions to the Mint figures.
This ground has been covered before, but not to such an extent. Examples include these:
In The Fantastic 1804 Dollar, p. 50, Eric P. Newman and Kenneth E. Bressett said the following:
"Obverse dies were used until they failed, and good dies were not withdrawn when the year of their dating had passed." In his Encyclopedia, p. 428, Walter H. Breen stated this: "Mintage reported for 1801 consisted largely of coins dated 1800; similar backdating was the rule through 1804."