Lots for sale in the second part of the James A Stack Snr coin collection auction are attracting bids of hundreds of thousands of dollars weeks before the auction opens.
The sale is hosted by Stack’s Bowers Galleries in three sessions on February 3.
It will be the second and final installment of auctions of the collection of James Stack (no relation to the auction house), a New York business man and Republican Party official who quietly built one of the most significant American coin collections.
This 1911 D Indian Eagle has attracted a bid of $240,000 already. Image courtesy of Stack’s Bowers Galleries.
Stack died in 1951, but stipulations in his will meant no sales were made from the collection until the 1970s. Since then there have been a series of significant and valuable auctions from his holdings.
These sales list over 200 coins from the remaining collection.
The first sale, in August last year, realised over $15 million.
The standout item was an 1804 silver dollar that realised over $6 million, the ninth highest price made by a US coin at auction.
The next sale is also full of valuable gems from US numismatic history.
Stack’s Bowers, through whom Mr Stack bought much of his collection, have focused on what they call “one of the most significant Proof Liberty Head gold coins of any denomination or date that we have ever brought to auction.”
The coin is a Proof 1899 half eagle. Only 99 were minted, and this example is the best preserved.
It carries an estimate of $300,000 and has already attracted a bid of $65,000.
Other coins are also attractive pre-sale interest.
An 1851 Augustus Humbert $50 coin is under offer for $240,000.
The coin is a “slug” struck during the California Gold Rush, and renowned for their size and gold content. Stack’s Bowers describe the coin as “massive and iconic” as an “ecapsulation of the dramatic wealth and excess of the Gold Rush era.”
The last comparable sale was in 2010 when a Humbert slug (reportedly in better condition) made $546,250.
