Q. David Bowers
NGC and PCGS Grand Totals: Analysis
The figures below represent the grand totals of Peace dollars certified in all grades from MS-60 through MS-67, ranked in order from the commonest to the rarest, as reflected by the number of certified by NGC and PCGS as of September 1992.
1923: 56,026
1922: 25,489
1925: 16,545
1924: 11,390
1922-D: 5,240
1926: 4,697
1921: 4,557
1935: 3,313
1926-S: 2,764
1925-S: 2,669
1922-S: 2,657
1927: 2,577
1928: 2,506
1923-S: 2,483
1927-D: 2,435
1926-D: 2,375
1927-S: 2,349
1934: 2,142
1923-D: 1,988
1928-S: 1,698
1935-S: 1,635
1934-D: 1,583
1924-S: 1,493
1934-S: 885
The Les and Sue Fox Ratings
A decade ago, in an era before NGC and PCGS, Les and Sue Fox's Silver Dollar Fortune Telling book was a best seller. I have found the later (1987) edition to be particularly valuable. The authors take an issue
and give population estimates for these grade levels:
Circulated grades, MS-60, MS-63 to MS-65, and MS-65 to MS-67. Here are several of the Fox ratings:
1921: Circulated: 38,000; MS-60: 9,000; M5-63/5: 1,300; MS-65/7: 100.
1923: Circulated: 6,500,000; MS-60: 5,000,000; MS-63/5: 225,000; MS-65/7: 11,500.
1928-S: Circulated: 66,000; MS-60: 8,500; MS-63/5: 2,000; MS-65/7: 850.
1934-S: Circulated: 42,000; MS-60: 1,475; MS-63/5: 450; MS-65/7: 250.
The Fox ratings have the advantage that they are based upon the extensive experience of the authors and, obviously, involved data from many sources. They have the disadvantage that they were compiled in the pre-certification era, and no one in the mid-1980s knew how common or rare certain high-grade Peace dollars were in relation to each other.
The Author's Rarity Ratings: Sources
In 1992, as these words are being written, I have several advantages, and I have employed all of them in creating my rarity estimates:
Source 1: I have the ratings of others to consult, such as John Highfill and Les and Sue Fox. In addition, there are many excellent texts with numerical or adjectival information concerning the rarity of Peace dollars, including Walter H. Breen's Encyclopedia and Wayne Miller's Morgan and Peace Dollar Textbook. A wealth of excellent information has been consulted (see Bibliography). Many ephemeral articles and comments, many of great value, have been printed in Coin World, COINage Magazine, Coins Magazine, Numismatic News, and The Numismatist in recent decades. Pioneer writers such as Wayne Miller were on their own and did not have the advantages I have had.
Although it does not address rarity ratings except to quote population reports, no discussion of research in the Peace dollar series would be complete without mentioning the Comprehensive Catalogue and Encyclopedia of Morgan and Peace Dollars, a numismatic tour de force by Leroy C. Van Allen and A. George Mallis. Now in its third edition, this volume details the known die varieties of Peace dollars and gives much valuable historical information concerning them. As is true of the Morgan dollar series, die varieties described in this book are given "VAM" (Van Allen-Mallis) numbers, such as VAM-1, VAM-2, etc.
Source 2: I have the population reports published by PCGS, NGC, and ANACS, which furnish an excellent guide to the relative rarity of expensive Peace dollars.
Source 3: I have a great deal of market information (which in some instances equates to relative rarity information) available from The Coin Dealer Newsletter, various privately publishedinvestment newsletters, auction prices realized, etc.
Source 4: I have a great fund of historical information about the Treasury releases of Peace dollars, some of which is given in the present book. Most of this information from the years prior to about 1960 has been used little, if at all, by other researchers. For example, the knowledge that S-Mint bags were available in quantity directly from the San Francisco Mint in the 1940s and 1950s will come as a surprise to many. In general, most other authors have concentrated upon either the 1962-4 Treasury release or the Redfield Estate (1976), but not earlier data.
Source 5: I have a good deal of experience to draw from, my own (I became a collector in 1952 and a dealer in 1953, and at an early date spent a lot of time at banks looking through silver dollars) as well as that of Harry J. Forman, Ruth Bauer, John Skubis, Robert Johnson, and others quoted or cited in the book. Interestingly, recollections about Morgan and Peace dollars have a strong regional bias as to the coins seen and handled. Ask an old-timer in Montana about what Peace dollars he has observed, and you will get an entirely different answer from that given by a Pennsylvania or Illinois specialist. For example, in the 1950s, I never saw a significant number of Mint State San Francisco dollars in mixed bags of this denomination; virtually all S-Mint coins were worn. Common Philadelphia Mint dollars in Uncirculated grade abounded and, in fact, were a big nuisance. On the other hand, someone looking through silver dollars in northern California in the 1950s would have been annoyed with finding so many common Uncirculated S-Mint coins!