A bunch of Morgan and Peace dollars - Where to start? 0

[ButchMcQueen]

Hey All,

New (i.e., clueless!) guy here. I've inherited 88 Morgan dollars and 65 Peace dollars. The Morgans breakdown as:

Morgan - 9 GSA Hoard CC dollars 1880 to 1884 Still in unopened hard plastic cases

Morgan - 40 from 1878 to 1903 various mintage

Morgan - 39 from 1921 various mintage

Peace - 1922 to 1928 various mintage

To my untrained eye the condition of these coins ranges from a Sheldon Scale Good 4 to MS65 or higher.

None of these have been professionally graded.

My question is, what is the smartest thing a newbie in my situation. can do? Should  I upgrade to an Elite membership and bulk submit these - assuming I can - on the one hand they are all $1 coins, but on the other hand they aren't all the same kind of $1 coin so I don't know how the rules would work there. Should I just submit the nicer looking stuff to be graded and put the rest to one side?  I don't mind paying for grading, but I don't know if it makes sense to spend the money having some of the lesser ones looked at.  Any advice would be appreciated!

thanks,

Butch

[Henri Charriere]

You have coins that are already holdered and protected, possibly 100, and with silver melt value at nearly $30, you have quite a bit of resources to fall back on.

The CC dollars are the ones collectors are drawn to. I would try to get an idea of what they are worth first.

I would group them as you have, check the prices in the latest "Red Book," and, unless there is a compelling interest to sell them, continue to store them, as is.

 

[J P M]

I do not recommend sending in the coins until you know what you have. Any coin in a case or holder should be left alone for now. You can post pictures here of any coins you have a question on the members would be happy to help if you post one coin per thread both sides close cropped shots.

Edited June 12 by J P M

[Sandon]

    Welcome to the NGC chat board.

    The last thing you would want to do as a new collector is to submit these coins to a third-party grading service. Common date and mint, circulated Morgan and Peace dollars may not be worth much more than their current high silver value of about $23 per coin. The minimum grading fee at NGC would also be $23 per coin, plus substantial processing, shipping and insurance costs. Unless a coin has a market value of at least several hundred dollars, it isn't cost effective for a collector to submit it to a grading service.

    You state that you inherited these coins. The laws of many states require that property go through a probate proceeding before it can be distributed to heirs or will beneficiaries, and this process usually involves an appraisal of the market value of the property as of the date of the owner's death.  You should first determine whether the coins were appraised and ask the estate lawyer or executor for a copy of the estate appraisal.  Otherwise, you will need to determine the dates, mints and approximate grades (condition) of the coins before you can attempt to value them. Please see the following forum topic to locate basic resources from which you can learn to identify and get some idea of the coins' condition:

   The basic resources you will need for your purposes are a current (2025) or recent "Red Book" as identified in this topic and a grading guide. If you don't want to purchase these relatively inexpensive books, you can use such online resources as PCGS Photograde, PCGS Coinfacts, the NGC Coin Explorer, and the NGC and PCGS price guides.  You can also post images of a few of the coins for our opinions, but this wouldn't be practical for all 153 coins.

     

[ButchMcQueen]

I appreciate the good advice here!  I don't think I'll lose any money having the GSA CC's graded, so I think I'll start with those. Hopefully, that will give me at least a little bit of a feel for how far out of line my thoughts on their condition are compared to the reality of a TPG's view of them.

The backstory on these is that my grandfather collected most of them starting back in the 1920s and for years they lived in a storage chest in his bedroom. My dad bought the GSA CCs from the GSA auctions in the 1970s and he put them straight into in a bank safe deposit box. When my dad inherited his dad's coins in the late 1980s they went straight into a safe deposit box. My dad passed away 12 years ago and they went straight from his safe deposit box into mine.

Sandon brought up the point of inheritance and the legal aspects of coins as part of an estate. A concern I hadn't even considered. Still, since I was my dad's sole beneficiary in his will and my inheritance is well below the threshold of inheritance taxes, I think I'm okay there. 

So fast forward 12 years and now I'm at the point where I'm retired and looking to start putting some of my own affairs in order. Considering how long some of these have been in the family I'm still pondering if I would even want to sell any of them. Even if I decide not to, I think I'm doing my kids a favor if I can establish some kind of a ballpark figure for what they're worth.

Again, thanks for helping me start my education here. Once I have a better feel for the silver dollars I'll be moving on to pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and even a smattering of paper currency, so I'm sure I'll be here with more questions in the future and at some point might learn enough to start making a few contributions!

[powermad5000]

Hello and welcome to the hobby and the forum!
 

EXCELLENT acquisition!!!! 

I would say the GSA holdered ones are safe to submit. Other than that, I would NOT submit any others until your determine what you actually have and the potential values.

Just because a Morgan is a G4 does not mean it is worth melt value. Think 1893 S which in G grade is currently listing in the price guide at $4,000. Any of the key date Morgans even in the grade of Good will be worth far more substantially than melt value. Same for the 1921 and 1928 Peace dollars.

What I think you SHOULD do is save your money by submitting this many coins to a TPG and invest a small amount into purchasing two books. The first being the Red Book of United States Coins, now available for the 2025 year. Also I would purchase a book titled ANA Grading Standards for United States Coins, 7th Edition. The first book will help with values and the second book has pictures reflecting the grading so you should be able to match yours to the book to get a good idea of grades and potential values.

If you got these books, I am sure you would not need to post tons of pics on here and inquire opinions except for a few that you may be unsure of where they might fall as far as grade. Be aware with this many dates, there are VAM's potentially mixed in with your normal strikes (there are currently 468 accepted VAM varieties accepted by NGC). Some of these VAM's are worth more than those normal and common ones.

With that many, you have your work cut out for you, but if there is anything you are unsure of, feel free to post clear, cropped pics of both sides of one you have a question about and if there are several, remember to post each one in its own thread as putting multiple coins in the same thread just gets too confusing.

 

[ButchMcQueen]

Powermad5000,

I've ordered both the books you recommended. I suspect I'll be getting my money's worth out of both of them!  Thanks for the good advice.

[GoldFinger1969]

On 6/13/2024 at 1:10 AM, ButchMcQueen said:

Powermad5000,I've ordered both the books you recommended. I suspect I'll be getting my money's worth out of both of them!  Thanks for the good advice.

Good start, Butch.  And welcome to the forums !  

I would listen to our veterans here, and where they differ, just use caution and your best judgement.  For instance, rather than clog up this thread or create multiple ones with pictures of all the coins, I would do a little research on the coin types you have...including the books you ordered.....and then post the 2 or 3 most VALUABLE (as far as you can tell) coins here and ask for our thoughts. If those coins -- whatever they are, GSAs or CCs or Morgans or Peace or any combination thereof -- are still only worth $200 or less, then in the aggregate you are going to NOT want to send in the bulk of the inheritance for professional grading.   It's not going to be financially worthwhile whether you keep or sell the collection.

OTOH...if your top coins are worth high-triple digits or maybe over $1,000....then maybe a bulk submittance by yourself or a dealer that you know (or others can vouch for) might be worthwhile.  Keep in mind you can EASILY spend a few hundred dollars or even thousands of dollars on grading fees so unless you know they are valuable and/or want them graded for future ease of valuation/sale...or are going to sell them in the near future....no need to do that except for the most valuable coins.  If you are also going to be collecting instead of liquidating (adding to your collection, in other words).....you can always get these coins graded over time.  There's no rush, take a year or two to get them graded and confirm it's worth it by submitting what you consider the most valuable ones first. 

Good Luck !!  We're here to help.

Edited June 13 by GoldFinger1969

[GoldFinger1969]

On 6/12/2024 at 1:20 AM, ButchMcQueen said:

Morgan - 9 GSA Hoard CC dollars 1880 to 1884 Still in unopened hard plastic cases

Guys....wouldn't these pretty much be MS-62 or better by default ? 

If so, these are worth $200-$250, minimum, right ?  Any special features like PL or DMPL...higher MS grade....or other special features.....should be worth closer to $500, maybe more.

[ButchMcQueen]

Goldfinger, The idea that in all likelihood I should expect at least around $200 a piece for the GSA CC's is where my thinking is at as well.  To my novice eye they all look pretty good, which I appreciate is a really vague standard!  The photos of this 1883 coin are representative of the average condition of these coins. The picture quality isn't as good as it should be - I'm still trying to dial in lighting and so on. Photographing shiny objects turns out to be more challenging than I would have guess. The coins are actually a lot brighter than what this photo indicates, but the minor scratches and the smudges are representative of what I'm seeing with a x5 magnifying glass.

Thanks for your insights on this!

 

[GoldFinger1969]

Butch....for the GSAs, in the future, capturing the entire case with the coin centered should be good enough.  The features on the site should let us zoom-in.  If you angle the holder at 30-degrees, it should minimize glare and make for decent pics.  The pics above weren't bad. 

ANYTHING Carson City has been hot the last 2-3 years so the CC GSAs should be worth $$$. 

What's your goal down the line...sell the most valuable parts ...just get values and grades for most or all of the collection.....add to the collection ?

 

[J P M]

I think that picture is good looking and so is the coin. If more of the coins in the collection look like this one, I would be happy.

Edited June 14 by J P M

[powermad5000]

While many of the GSA encased Morgans were of higher quality, there is also a spread of grades in those cases from what I have seen over the years. Goldfinger is correct that MS 62 is a totally reasonable expectation of the lower of grade you would get on these. I have seen some at that level and very very few slightly below that, but you could use that number as a reasonable expectation. I would say your 1883 here would grade as MS 64. Keep in mind I don't have the coin in hand and am offering a grading opinion off of a photo. 

Glad to see you invested in those books first as to me they are worth more than TPG grading for someone entering the hobby.

Feel free to keep returning to this thread if you have any questions. Most of us have been at this for many decades and we don't tire that easily. LOL!