Owner Comments:
While this set does not include a Silver Eagle, 1986 was the first year that the US mint started making and selling the silver and gold American Eagle Bullion Coins. Those silver bullion coins were the first things I started snapping up when I got back into coin collecting (and certified coins) back in 2007/2008 and started my interest in NCLT series that dominated my first few years here. I’ve always had a fascination with silver dollars, and I saw these coins as modern silver dollars - even though they kind of are and kind of aren’t.
I also just loved the idea of having a US coin series that started the year I was born. It brought back reading “The Hundred Penny Box” as a kid and having a collection of coins with a coin for every year of your life, except this collection could be silver dollars - my favorite type of coin since I was a kid. It seemed perfect.
I still have a solid set of MS69 Silver Eagles, but I haven’t kept it up to date the last decade or so because I went through a period where I couldn’t afford them and then I became disenchanted with all the special issues and reverse proofs and all of this other stuff that started to make the series feel like more of a chore to collect.
1986 also happened to be the Centennial for the Statue of Liberty, so we got Silver half dollar, Silver Dollar and Gold $5 commemoratives for the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island
75% Copper, 25% Nickel (Cupronickel) over a pure copper center / core
Mintage: 13,107,633
11.30 grams
30.61 mm diameter
Designer: Gilroy Roberts / Frank Gasparro
Modified Presidential Seal (1964-1974, 1977-Date)
This coin is the only remaining piece of the original set that was made by submitting coins from mint sets we bought at coin shows and searched through. The most promising coins were submitted for grading to fill these registry sets. The kinds of grades we got on average and the fact that so many of those coins have subsequently been replaced by already graded, higher grade examples I guess says a lot for just how bad my stepfather and I were at grading coins.
Even so, we did score a few big wins from that submission. This MS66, while it isn't an MS67, was a solid grade / coin for the slot and that's why this one has managed in endure in the set so well. This coin may one day be replaced if I ever find an MS67 at a price I'm willing to pay at the time, but I like the look of this coin and I'm in no rush to see it upgraded.