Rusty,
When the Carson City Coin of the Week project was first launched, the small group of participating C4OA members all agreed that you would be the one to write the articles on the key four coins in the Carson City series. We all recognized that no one but you had the appropriate level of expertise to author such essays. But, at least for this Coin of the Week participant, there was a little bit of a letdown as the challenge would have been enticing.
As the COTW project matured, I quickly came to my senses. After writing only a few Coin of the Week articles, it became clear that the subject of Carson City coins was many times more complex than I had supposed. The project, required a heck of a lot more than mere research. To author articles about the four rarest of the CC series would require far more experience, perspective and writing talent that this intermediate level coin collector could hope to develop over the term of this project. Who else, but our very own Carsonite, would introduced the big four with such literary style...
"Royalty graces the kingdom of Carson City coins."
Your first, of the four final Carson City Coin of the Week articles, drives home my point. The core of your methodology, Knowledge Based Collecting, is literally mirrored in your Knowledge Based Writing, producing a master essay on the Queen of Carson City coins, the 1870-CC Double Eagle.
I copied the article and added it to my ever-growing CC data base for future reference. But as is true with every interesting discussion of Carson City coins, the facts beget questions which,in turn, create more interest. For instance, in your discussions of the 1870-CC Double Eagle's rise in prominence and value, you describe the general lack of understanding about the subject coin's value and extant population. You wrote;
"One thing that had become crystal clear is that no one—not the Greysheet experts, not the coin dealers, not advanced collectors—recognized the true values of rare Carson City gold coins. Not just 1870-CC double eagles, but any rare “CC” gold pieces."
To make your point, you gave a couple examples where the hammer prices in Sotheby and Bowers & Morena auctions vastly outstripped the contemporary published pricing at that time for the 1870-CC Double Eagle. I immediately thought, that it takes two to tango. There appeared to be at least a couple of bidders who recognized the coin's value. How else would those prices have been pushed to where they ended up? My guess is that at least one of them was a certain CC expert from Reno Nevada? The other may have been Douglas Winter? If not they, who else?
Another question that popped up for me concerned the Bass specimen, which you describe as having been re-graded to ever increasing higher levels. Would this coin have retained its Bass pedigree, or would that have been purposely shielded from the grading services during its many resubmissions?
Thanks sincerely for this terrific article on the Queen of Carson City coins. I'm looking forward to the rest of the royal family's biographies and whatever further intrigue these monarchs of CC citizenry may present.
Belay Off
C4OA Lifer!
