The American silver dollar has had a long history. The
difficulty in tracing the history of the different kinds of silver coins is one
reason why you can get fooled by counterfeits. If you want to be a collector of
silver dollars, you have to know a bit about them first. Here are some silver
dollar types you might want to read more about:
Flowing Hair
It was on April 2, 1792 that the Mint Act was passed.
The striking of silver dollars thus became legal. Conflict between the
Secretaries of State and Treasury however delayed the release of the first
silver dollar. It was therefore only in 1794 that the Flowing Hair silver dollar
was released. It was around until 1795.
This first silver dollar was designed by Robert Scot. It
was far from being uniformly perfect. Some dollars were struck underweight while
others were overweight. Weight problems were settled by filing or silver
insertions. This American silver dollar contained 89.24% silver. The rest of the
coin is copper. It is about 40 mm in diameter and 26.96 g.
Draped Bust
The Draped Bust followed in 1795 until 1804. It was at
this point that different varieties of the same coin type were released. In 1797
alone for example, you can have a silver dollar with 7 large letters on the
right while another one has small letters. There is also one with 10 arrows and
one with 4 berries. The design of this coin was still by Robert Scot. The tails
side was done by John Eckstein.
It is also worth noting that they really stopped minting
in 1803. The 1804 dollars were really made in 1834 as special gifts to some
foreign dignitaries. There are only eight 1804 American silver dollar Draped
Bust coins known to be still around. This is why this particular dollar from
this year is considered to be extremely rare and valuable.
Gobrecht
The production of silver dollars stopped for many years.
It only resumed in 1836. The first coins in this year bear the name of Gobrecht
who was the one who got the dies ready. They were produced until 1839. The
design of the coin has been credited to Titian Peale and Thomas Sully. Only very
few of these coins were made because they were not intended for circulation.
Like the 1804, silver dollar, a Gobrecht dollar is highly prized.
Seated Liberty
The American silver dollar came back in circulation from
1840-1873. Although this coin type was circulated, there were still limited
numbers of them. This may have been due to the civil war which broke out in
1961. The availability of silver fluctuated, thus resulting in differences in
yearly production. This coin carries the popular Seated Liberty design by
Christian Gobrecht.
These are only the earliest American silver dollar types
and designs in order of release. After the Seated Liberty of 1873, more popular
and more recent types were released. These included the Trade dollar, Morgan and
Peace. The most recent edition is the of course, the popular Silver Eagle dollar
with the Walking Liberty.
