Boldly overdated and attractively toned.A distinctive and attractive specimen. Impressively deep coppery-rose toning covers most of both sides, relenting at the peripheries and around devices to reveal light yellow gold and bold lustrous cartwheel.
Adjustment marks remain prominent at the central reverse, crossing at a 90 degree angle but chiefly horizontal on the shield and among the star cluster. A related softness at central obverse is observed at Libertys ear. Some hairlines are seen as a significant mark at Libertys chin and star 11. Bright and appealing with distinctive eye appeal. A thin crack connects all letters of LIBERTY at their tops, and nearly all stars are likewise delicately connected with thin die cracks. Elusive in all grades, this overdate variety captures the imagination with its bold use of an unused 1804 die. Nearly all examples show significant adjustment marks and their inherent central softness, making a search for a perfectly made example at any level of preservation an essentially impossible task. It has been more than 15 years since any PCGS-graded Mint State coin of this issue has been sold.
David W. Akers, whose grading would be described as conservative today, stated strictly Mint State examples are exceedingly rare and I have never personally examined one, although a few are reported to exist. The coin offered here has sold at auction just twice in the last two decades. When Akers wrote of the issue in 1975, this example was in the long-term James A. Stack Collection and may not have been known to him.
The only piece ever certified finer by PCGS, and last sold in 2003, is the 1912 Earle coin. The 1968 Shuford coin is in the Harry W. Bass, Jr. Collection at the American Numismatic Association, J.P. Morgans is in the American Numismatic Society, and the Anderson-Dupont-Lilly coin is in the National Numismatic Collection along with the one placed in the Mint Cabinet generations earlier.
