PO Box 619999
Dallas, TX 75261-6199
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2801 W. Airport Freeway
Dallas, Texas 75261-4127
(Northwest corner of W. Airport Freeway [HWY-183] & Valley View Lane)
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800-USCOINS (872-6467)(214) 528-3500
Fax: (214) 409-1425
Auction Name: 2025 October 2 - 5 GACC US Coins Signature® Auction
Lot Number: 3194
Shortcut to Lot: HA.com/1386*3194
1907 $20 High Relief, Wire Rim, MS65+ PCGS. With a mind toward creating for the United States a coinage of some beauty, President Theodore Roosevelt commissioned the famed American sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens to create new designs for the circulating denominations, with the first coins to be visited being the ten and twenty dollar gold pieces. In Numismatic Art in America, Cornelius Vermeule notes:
"Barber and Morgan would have been the logical artists to redesign these coins, unaltered in essence since 1838 and 1849 respectively, but Roosevelt has been convinced by Saint-Gaudens and others that the artists who were responsible for the academic creations of 1892, the regular coinage and the World's Columbian Exposition coins and medallic reverse, could by no means be expected to produce coins (a numismatic art) that would rival those (that) of classical Greece."
Saint-Gaudens' perspective on what was necessary to create such beautiful coinage would prove to be correct, however, it steadfastly ignored a challenge that the Mint's own engravers Barber and Morgan would have foreseen: limitations in the Mint's mechanical ability to strike high relief coins for mass production. Saint-Gaudens High Relief double eagle design, beloved even today as the most beautiful coin ever issued by the Mint for general circulation, had to be struck multiple times to bring up the design elements well. As a result, in late 1907, Barber was forced to work with Saint-Gaudens' assistant Henry Hering in delivering a low-relief version of the design that, as Saint-Gaudens had predicted, omitted the artistic excellence of the ancient Greek coinage so desired by Roosevelt.
For collectors, though, the High Relief 1907 double eagle remains collectible, and even Gem-quality pieces can be acquired with some patience and funds. The present coin is spectacular compared to its peers, showing bright, glistening mint luster bathed in vivid yellow-gold and sunset-orange hues. It is sharp and largely pristine, save for a thin vertical graze near the left obverse rim at 9 o'clock that will serve as a pedigree marker for this exceptional piece.(Registry values: N7079)
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