1878-CC $20 Liberty Head Double Eagle PCGS XF45

NEW LOWER PRICE. Here is a unique opportunity for the sophisticated numismatist to acquire a true rarity in the Carson City Double Eagle sub-series. With its small mintage of 13,190, there are only three Carson City $20s with lower mintages:

1870-CC ……   3,789

1879-CC …… 10,708

1891-CC ……   5,000

Writes David Akers, “The 1878-CC is a rare date in all grades; in fact, it is the fourth rarest CC-Mint Double Eagle, just nosing out the lower mintage 1879-CC. Virtually all known specimens grade in the F to EF grades and a strictly graded AU is a rarity. In full mint state, the 1878-CC is extremely rare and the few known uncs, with one notable exception, are barely Unc-60.”

The Carson City Mint, where this specimen was produced in 1878. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.

At the time silver dollars were called Bland dollars or standard dollars, but today we call them Morgan dollars after the designer-engraver George T. Morgan. The mintage of Carson City Morgan dollars for 1878, the first year of the series, was 2,212,000.

It is quite possible that the officers and workers at the Carson City Mint were just overwhelmed with the work involved in producing so many silver dollars that little time and effort was available to produce double eagles. The mint facility in Carson City was smaller than the mints of Philadelphia, New Orleans, and San Francisco, and thus did not have the capability to produce as many coins as the others.