A Fittingly Fast Delivery of a Mercury Dime

Shipped just yesterday, my first slabbed Mercury Dime arrived today. (The shipping notice was sent Monday, but that was a holiday.) In addition to my efforts to build a quality collection of large cents and more recently of half dimes, I want to assemble a decent type set. When I saw that top quality, common date Mercury dimes are available and not too awfully expensive, I started looking at auction offerings. I picked one out from the Heritage auction at the FUN show and got it with a live, on-line, cut bid. (Yes, this was a case of not being happy about being outbid before the live event, and deciding to go for it at the last opportunity.)

In an absolute sense, this is easily the highest quality coin in my collection of regular issue coins. It is NGC graded MS 68 FB, one of about 100 1944-D dimes so graded by NGC/PCGS. There is no doubt about the FB designation. It has terrific luster all the way to the highest points of the design. It takes very close inspection under my 10x loupe to find a few minuscule imperfections. It is mostly "white", with some subtle golden toning. The toning is most apparent (and most attractive!) on the rims of both sides when viewed from some angles under strong light. I paid a somewhat strong price for it, but am very happy with it.

Moving forward, I hope to find similar quality 20th century coins to serve in my type set. But I still have my eye on one of the Holmes middle date large cents, and another pricey cent that's been sitting in a dealer's stock since he outbid me for it last spring.

Here's a photo of my new dime. There are apparently a couple 68*FBs out there. One was sold recently by Heritage, and I think it's ugly. I'm considering posting a comparison. Stay tuned. Pleasurable collecting to all!