Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1883-05-31

the silver dollar of 1904. This is one Of
! the rarest of all the American silver
pieces, not more than six authentic
specimens, according to the opinion of
trustworthy experts, being in existence. /.
There is no certainty as to the reason
for the scarcity of dollars of this date,
but it is legend among collectors that
| in 1904 there was cargo of tea received
in this country on the cash basis, and
| it took all the dollars of that years
coinage between SIS, 900 and $40, 900
to satisfy the Chinese, who have always
had a holy horror of subsidiary coin.
One of the peculiarities of the Chinese
is that all foreign coins of standard
value received by them is recoined by
their Government. The same rule pre-
walls in this country as to foreign coin,
which must be sent to the assay Office
and thence to the mint for coinage before
it can go into general circulation.
The scarcity of the 1904 silver dollars
/ long since inspired the genius of un-
principled men, and the result is that
there are many copies of the old coin in
existence that pass as genuine, and are
shown in otherwise good collections.
AS has already been said, there are
| only six of the genuine coins now
/ AAAOWA4J OAlOCO iA4G@O oAAGOOA IL oAAON -OetoOo
are accurate fac-similes, perhaps, but
they are not genuine, nevertheless.
| There is a story among collectors to the
! effect that relative of the Superinten-
| dent of the mint-a son, it is believed
| caused dozen or fifteen impressions
from the original die of the 1904 dollar
to be made, and sold them even then at
fancy prices; but the old gentleman,
the soul of honor, found out what he
| had done, and managed at great ex-
pense, to suppress all but two or three
! evidences of his son s crime; but several
counterfeits of the 1904 dollar have
been made, and some of these are fond
! ly believed in by their owners. In 1876
one of these was offered to well-knOwn
| Philadelphia collector, who was nearly
taken in by it. Since that time the 1904
dollar has been sold four or five times,
generally for from $500 to $500. There
was doubt of the authenticity of each
of these specimens, although if they are
counterfeits they are very nearly equal
to the genuine.
| Six or seven years ago silver dollars
of 1901, 1902 and 1903 were offered for
sale to J. Calvin Randall, the Chestnut
street collector, for $50 each. He re-
quested that they be left with him for
examination, and his inspection proved
that they were not of the dates they
bore, although they were of standard
silver and approved weight. In the
1902 dollar the 2 was out of plumb and
there were several other defects that did
not appear in the genuine.
els there any cOunterfeiting of rare
coinsP' Mr.. Randall was asked yester-
day.
''There has not been great deal
hitherto" was the reply. ''but if the
demand increases as it has been doing
within the last few years, it cannot fail
to bring forth hosts of counterfeits. You
see, Flood, one of the California bonanza
men, has been bitten with the mania for
collection, and has his agent at all the
sales. Then there are Mr.. Garrett,
very wealthy gentleman of Baltimore,
and L. Parmlee of Boston, baker of
lpork and beans, but very rich, and half
a score of other ardent collectors, all of
whom stand ready to pay high prices for
rarities. n1804 dollar, genuine, should
be worth at least 1000; and think
if any of them come under the hammer
you will find very heavy bidding for
them. The last one that was sold fell
to H. S. Adams, the cashier of the Bos-
ton postoffice, for $500. That was dirt
cheap. The coin originally belonged to
Colonel Cohen, of Baltimore, who got it
somewhere in Virginia. It's now in the
collection of Parmlee, of Boston. don't
know what he paid for it. Altogether,
though, think the temptation to coun-
terfeit rare coins just now is very
strong, the taste for collecting is spread
ing so widely, and do not think that
public. warning will be out of place. I
believe the ''re-strikers'' of the 1904
dollar made by the mint officials are not
marked on the edges like the coins that
got into circulation. Shrewd collectors
fight shy of 1904 silver dollars unless
they have very perfect pedigrees and
, don't blame them l have an electrOtype
copy only"
; els the business of coin collecting a
, profitable oneP"
cit used to be in the old times. Then
!, man could start in business on 5000,
but now S25, 900 is a very small capital
to begin with. The profits are some
: times large, but then you must consider
that collector has to carry large
! amount of solid cash in stock that never
. pays any interest"
For many years past a notion has
l prevailed generally that the penny of
7 1915 is a rarity and worth bio price.
I The fact is that there were no pennies
! issued in 1915, and this knocks the
bottom out of the good old story that
some gold crept into the copper of 1915,
and that fifteen pennies full of gold
were coined. The coinage of 1915 con-
n sisted of silver half and quarter. dollars
e and IS gold pieces. The latter are very
5 rare and sell at $500 Philadelphia
IL Press.