5417

1796 $2 1/2 No Stars MS61 PCGS.

Currency:USD Category:Coins & Paper Money / US Coins Start Price:26,000.00 USD Estimated At:1.00 - 1,000,000.00 USD
1796 $2 1/2 No Stars MS61 PCGS.
<B>1796<$2 1/2> No Stars MS61 PCGS.</B></I> Breen-1, Breen-6113, Bass-3002, High R.4. About 40 years ago, when Walter Breen published his monographs on the quarter eagles, he considered this issue to be High R.6, meaning that only 13 to 18 examples survived. At that time or before, there was some confusion regarding the order of strike and the number of coins known. Official Mint delivery records indicate that quarter eagles were struck and delivered at different times. Coins were delivered on September 22, 1796 and December 8, 1796 with 66 and 897 pieces delivered, respectively. One additional delivery of quarter eagles amounted to 432 coins, but these were not actually delivered by the Chief Coiner to the Mint treasurer until January 14, 1797. At one time, it was believed that the 432 pieces delivered in 1797 were actually coined in 1797. Montroville Dickeson, for example, claimed a mintage of just 963 coins for the 1796 quarter eagles. It is intriguing that Dickeson, who was not the most knowledgeable of numismatists, recorded that two types and three varieties of 1796 quarter eagles existed. Today, there are exactly two types and three varieties known, although one of these three was not generally known to exist until the 20th century.<BR> The three varieties that are known today were recorded in <I>The Harry W. Bass, Jr. Museum Sylloge,</B></I> and assigned numbers HBCC-3001, 3002, and 3003. The letters HBCC represent "Harry Bass Core Collection," the appropriate designation created by author Q. David Bowers to provide a unique cataloging system. The first two varieties are from a single No Stars obverse. Variety-3001 is a rarity with only six examples known, representing about 10% of the September 22 delivery of 66 coins. Variety-3002 is considered High R.4 with about 90 examples known, or about 10% of the December 8, 1796 delivery of 897 coins. Variety-3003, the only varie