By CoinWeek ….
After years of waning collector interest, the United States Mint stopped producing special Proof coins for collectors in 1916, which also happened to be the first year of issue for the Winged Liberty or Mercury Dime. After leaving the numismatic community wanting for two decades, the Mint resumed Proof production in 1936. This makes the 1936 Mercury Dime Proof the first Proof issue of the popular series and GreatCollections is offering a superb example graded PF68 by NGC in this Sunday’s auction of classic and modern U.S. coins.
The new era of Proofs started off somewhat tentatively, with only 4,130 Mercury Dime Proofs struck in 1936. Compared to the 87.5 million business strike dimes minted that year–one of the larger mintages of the Mercury Dime series–this is a small number, indeed. Pent-up collector demand, however, made the program a success, and Proof mintages would increase for the next six years until Proof production went on another hiatus in 1943.
NGC reports 1,217 total grading events for the 1936 Mercury Dime Proof, with only four in the top pop grade of PF68. The brilliant and white example being offered by GreatCollections is one of the finest certified by NGC but noticeably not designated Ultra Cameo or even Cameo. This is because 1936 Proofs with full cameo are extremely scarce; so much so that NGC has yet to grade one in 37 years.
1936 Mercury Dime Proofs of this grade infrequently appear in public coin auctions, but prices have ranged in the five figures over the last 20 years. At the time of writing, the starting bid on this 1936 Mercury Dime Proof is $25,000.
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To search through GreatCollection’s archive of over 600,000 certified coins and notes the company has sold over the past eight years, please visit the GreatCollections Auction Archives.
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Where do you go to turn in coins that are valuable? How do you know that you will not get ripped off or frauded!? I have a lot of coins that are old and bicentennial quarters.