Owner Comments:
This MS-64 1885-CC Morgan dollar that I bought as a boy is from the Lavere Redfield hoard of silver dollars. As a collector who loves coinage history, knowing the pedigree of a coin always enhances its collector value to me.
Nothing says “old west” like a Carson City Dollar minted with silver most likely mined from the Comstock Lode. Additionally, the 1885-CC dollar was the last coin minted at Carson City until 1889 when a new presidential administration came into power and the mint re-opened. After 1889, the Carson City Mint minted silver and gold coins through 1893 and served as an assay office for some time thereafter.
Another part of my coins' pedigree pertains to its previous owner, LaVere Redfield. LaVere Redfield, a stock and real estate investor, was a man who liked hard currency and did not trust banks (kind of sounds like a lot of us today). From his estate in Reno, Nevada, LaVere Redfield amassed a hoard of over 400,000 silver dollars and stored them in the basement of his house. Back in the days when LaVere Redfield amassed his hoard, silver dollars were readily available at face value through local banks and casinos. LaVere Redfield bought his dollars by the $1000 bag and dropped the bags through a coal chute into a hidden area of his basement. This accounts for the excessive bag marks on many of the coins from the hoard. After his death in 1974, his heirs auctioned the entire hoard for 7.3 million dollars and from there the coins were sold to individual collectors like me.