1895 Morgan Silver Dollar. Proof Details--Harshly Cleaned (NGC).This more affordable example of the eagerly sought 1895 Morgan dollar exhibits full, razor sharp Proof striking detail from the rims to the centers. Untoned apart from a blush of pale champagne-gold iridescence in the center of the reverse, both sides retain appreciable remnants of a bright, universally reflective finish from the dies. Heavy hairlining to the surfaces explains the NGC qualifier, although there are no sizeable or otherwise singularly mentionable marks.<p>As the sole Proof-only issue in the popular Morgan silver dollar series of 1878 to 1921, the 1895 has long enjoyed near-legendary status. Early generations of collectors were puzzled by an entry in Mint records that showed a circulation strike delivery of 12,000 coins for this year, and many theories arose to explain why the only 1895-dated examples were of the 880-piece Proof issue. Some said the circulation strikes were never released and were subsequently melted as part of the 270,232,722 silver dollars destroyed under the terms of the 1918 Pittman Act. Others believed these coins were never struck at all and the 12,000-piece figure represented nothing more than a bookkeeping error on the part of Mint personnel. Modern numismatic scholarship, however, suggests that the 12,000-coin mintage reported for 1895 represents a bookkeeping adjustment by the Mint to account for a final delivery of 1894-dated silver dollars. In any event, every collector seeking to assemble a complete date and mint set of Morgan dollars must acquire a Proof for the 1895, and the present specimen would do nicely in many cabinets.
