1908 Saint-Gaudens Double Eagle. Motto. MS-65+ (PCGS).The luster is soft and satiny across this beautiful Gem, blanketing the surfaces in a uniform matte-like texture. Rich, yellow-gold in hue and sharply rendered on each side. Outstanding in both technical and aesthetic quality. Far scarcer than its identically dated No Motto counterpart, the 1908 Motto double eagle is a low mintage affair with just 156,258 circulation strikes produced. An even more significant factor in determining this issues rarity is its distribution. Most early date issues in the Saint-Gaudens series were shipped overseas as international trade coins. While we believe that many examples of the 1908 Motto were used in this manner, an unusually large percentage of the mintage seems to have been retained in America until melted in 1937. Indeed, the 1908 Motto has only been minimally represented in repatriations of classic U.S. Mint gold coins from foreign bank hoards, and today it is among the scarcer issues of its type in Mint State. In Gem MS-65 the 1908 Motto is a decided condition rarity, this being one of our finest offerings for the issue in recent years. The present example is a delightful representative of this rare population and approaches the very finest known for the issue, with just 15 coins graded finer by PCGS through MS-67.
