1806 Draped Bust Half Dollar. O-122, T-25. Rarity-6. Pointed 6, Stem Through Claw. VF-35 (PCGS). CAC.Solid Condition Census quality for this elusive die marriage of the 1806 Draped Bust half dollar. Both sides are attractively toned with subtle champagne-apricot peripheral highlights to otherwise silver-lilac surfaces. The strike is ideally centered and nicely executed, the design retaining universally bold Choice VF detail from the rims to the centers. Pleasingly smooth for the assigned grade, an impressive provenance further enhances this coins desirability.<p>Overton-122 represents the third of what would eventually be six uses of this workhorse obverse, readily identifiable in most marriages by repunching to the letter Y in LIBERTY. It is up to the reverse, therefore, to confirm the rare O-122 attribution. This die, which is unknown in any other pairing, exhibits repunching along the left upright of the letter E in STATES. The prominent crack from the lower border into the shield developed early and soon advanced to the point where it felled this die, going a long way to explain the rarity of examples in numismatic circles. Of the 21 to 22 examples believed extant, the coin offered here is tied for CC#5 in the Tompkins census of 2015. Tompkins Die Stage 2/3.From the E. Horatio Morgan Collection. Earlier ex Superiors sale of the H.W. Blevins Collection of Early Half Dollars and Silver Dollars, June 1988, lot 3123.
