United States 1852-O 20 dollars
This specimen was lot 5950 in Künker sale 386 (Osnabrück, March 2023), where it sold for €4,000 (about US$5,169 including buyer's fees). The catalog description[1] noted,
"VEREINIGTE STAATEN VON AMERIKA, 20 Dollars 1852, O, New Orleans. Liberty. 30,09 g Feingold. GOLD. R Sehr schön-vorzüglich. (United States of America, twenty dollars of 1852, New Orleans mint, liberty head. Rare, very fine to extremely fine.)"
The New Orleans mint struck this type 1850-61 and 1879 (with motto). Its products are not rare but few survive in choice condition. This design was struck at Philadelphia, San Francisco and Carson City until 1907 with modifications to the reverse (in 1866, "IN GOD WE TRUST" was added and in 1877, "TWENTY DOLLARS" was spelled out.
Specification: 516 grains (33.436 grams), 1 1/3" (34 millimeters) diameter, 90% gold, silver not over 5%, rest copper; reeded edge.
Recorded mintage: 190,000.
Catalog reference: KM 74.1, Fr-171.
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- Breen, Walter H., Walter Breen's Complete Encyclopedia of U. S. and Colonial Coins, New York: Doubleday, 1987.
- Friedberg, Arthur L. and Ira S. Friedberg, Gold Coins of the World, From Ancient Times to the Present, 9th ed., Clifton, NJ: Coin and Currency Institute, 2017.
- Harper, David C., ed., North American Coins & Prices: A Guide to U. S., Canadian and Mexican Coins, 17th Ed., Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2007.
- Yeoman, R. S., and Kenneth Bressett (ed.), A Guide Book of United States Coins, 65th Ed., Atlanta, GA: Whitman Publishing, 2011.
- [1]Künker, Fritz Rudolf, Horst-Rudiger Künker, Ulrich Künker and Andreas Kaiser, Katalog 386: Brakteaten | Mainz | Bibliothek Prof. Dr. Niklot Klüßendorf | Mittelalter und Neuzeit | Goldprägungen | Deutsche Münzen ab 1871, Osnabrück: Fritz Rudolf Künker GmbH & Co., AG, 2023.
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