1836 Capped Bust Half Dollar. Reeded Edge. 50 CENTS. GR-1, the only known dies. Rarity-2. AU-53 (PCG

1836 Capped Bust Half Dollar. Reeded Edge. 50 CENTS. GR-1, the only known dies. Rarity-2. AU-53 (PCGS).Lovely golden-gray surfaces and overall sharp to full striking detail in an example of this classic key date half dollar issue. Plenty of original mint luster remains to further tempt the quality conscious collector. Though Walter Breen divined a mintage figure of 1,200 circulation strikes for the 1836 Reeded Edge half dollar decades ago, the true figure is undoubtedly several thousand higher. Breen worked from delivery statistics that showed 738,000 half dollars coined in November 1836 and 1,034,200 struck in December, but was otherwise nonspecific. While the first Reeded Edge half dollars were struck in November, Robert W. Julian has described "technical difficulties" that "were serious enough that [Chief Coiner Adam Eckfeldt] would be forced to return to the screw press and lettered-edge half dollars." Given the population of surviving 1836 Reeded Edge half dollars today, Julian has estimated that the mintage was actually closer to 5,000 pieces. Between the legendarily elusive Small Eagle half dollars of 1796 and 1797 and the scarce Philadelphia Mint dates between 1879 and 1890, no other half dollar issue approaches the low mintage of the 1836 Reeded Edge. The number struck was just a fraction of such well regarded dates as 1794 and 1815, without the relatively high survivorship and large Proof mintages of the final decade of the Liberty Seated design. Beyond its evident historical importance, the 1836 Reeded Edge has always been admired as a rarity. For most of the 19th century, this issue was deemed a pattern, too rare to have been issued for circulation. While listed in J. Hewitt Judds <em>United States Pattern, Trial, and Experimental Pieces</em> as Judd-57, a listing that remains in modern editions out of a sense of tradition, the 1836 Reeded Edge half dollar is now acknowledged as a regular issue coin. The vast majority of survivors show significant wear, AU survivors such as this scarce and always in demand.From the Boston Old City Hall Collection.