Owner Comments:
1995-W Silver Eagle - Mintage: 30,125
1995 was the first year that the US Mint produced more than one proof example of the American Silver Eagle. The 1995-P was easy to obtain, since it was sold individually. All I needed was the 1995-W silver proof to keep my collection complete, but the only way to get one directly from the mint was to buy the entire "American Eagle 10th Anniversary Gold and Silver Bullion Proof Set" which at the time cost around $1,000. There was no way I could afford that, so like many others I had little choice but to accept that there would be a perpetual hole in my collection. eBay had just barely come into existence and was certainly not yet the "go to" place to search for coins, but I was an avid reader of Coin World. In early 1996 I started seeing 1995W Proof Silver Eagles being offered by a few dealers and then a few more, so I started saving my money. Every week, I'd scour the ads hoping I had enough to buy one. Unfortunately, whenever I thought I was close, the prices would go up. Finally, in January 1997, my savings managed to outpace the price increases and I snagged the prize.
Elsie Viola Kachel and the lawyer/poet Wallace Stevens were married in 1909 and sometime thereafter, they moved into an apartment in a brownstone on New York's lower west side. The building was owned by a German-born sculptor named Adolph Weinman. Weinman had a rooftop studio and asked Elsie to model for him around 1913. She was 27 at the time, and if my calculations are correct, that means she would have been born in 1886. It seems quite fitting then that Weinman's beautiful half dollar design was resurrected exactly 100 years later for the American Silver Eagle. I had had this coin for a LONG time, and finally decided to submit it when NGC offered their limited time 25th Anniversary Black holder. The grade was no big surprise considering that fewer than 8 out of 100 receives the coveted PF70UC. Still, she looks pretty nice in black!
Date acquired: 1/15/1997 (raw coin)
Date graded: 12/20/2012 (self submitted to NGC)
Rev. 4/8/2014