I’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback about my prior articles on Appearance Rarity. In case you have a short memory—or didn’t read the earlier stories—it is my contention that CAC has now seen enough coins that we can make important observations about how rare (or not rare) a specific issue is in regards to its appearance. These observations work best on a comparative basis within a specific series.

The most recent series I’ve decided to analyze are the New Orleans eagles struck from 1841 through 1860. These are, of course, known as No Motto issues and they are popular with collectors. In this article, we will look at the appearance rarity of each issue in both circulated and Uncirculated grades as well as the total rarity. We’ll also compare these numbers to those I put forth in my recent book on New Orleans gold and see what these tell us.

A little background is in order before we head to the obligatory charts. The New Orleans No Motto eagle series contains a total of 21 issues. These coins were struck for 20 consecutive years and in 1854, there are two major varieties: the Small Date and the Large Date. It is well known that all No Motto eagles, regardless of the date or the mint of issue, are rare in Uncirculated. This is especially true with the New Orleans issues as even the more available issues have surviving populations of fewer than a dozen in Mint State-60 and finer.

It is always important when compiling these charts to ponder if enough No Motto New Orleans eagles have been submitted to CAC to make strong observations. I would tend to think that the answer is a strong “yes” but it is important to note that the two finest collections of New Orleans eagles (Tyrant and New England) contain a number of high-quality single coins which have never been sent to CAC. This impacts issues like the 1850-O which currently has a CAC population of zero coins in Uncirculated. But the coins in these two collections (one in MS65 and the other in MS64) will almost certainly sticker when sent to CAC, and this will raise the population significantly.

  
    NEW ORLEANS NO MOTTO EAGLE RARITY CHART
  

    DATE

    CIRCULATED
    UNCIRCULATED
    TOTAL
    RANKING
  

    1841-O
    8
    0
    8
    3
  

    1842-O
    17
    2
    19
    9
  

    1843-O
    35
    3
    38
    19
  

    1844-O
    32
    2
    34
    18
  

    1845-O*
    13
    7
    20
    10
  

    1846-O*
    20
    2
    22
    12
  

    1847-O
    97
    5
    102
    21
  

    1848-O
    27
    4
    31
    15
  

    1849-O
    11
    2
    13
    6
  

    1850-O
    20
    0
    20
    10, tie
  

    1851-O
    93
    6
    99
    20
  

    1852-O
    14
    0
    14
    7
  

    1853-O
    33

    0
    33
    17
  

    1854-O Sm. Dt.
    26
    0
    26
    14
  

    1854-O Lg. Dt. 
    30
    2
    32
    16
  

    1855-O
    10
    0
    10
    4
  

    1856-O
    10
    2
    12
    5
  

    1857-O
    7
    0
    7
    2
  

    1858-O
    22
    3
    25
    13
  

    1859-O
    4
    0
    4
    1
  

    1860-O
    15
    0
    15
    8
  

    TOTALS
    544
    40
    584
    
  

    6.84 % are Uncirculated

  

NOTES: The 1845-O and 1846-O contain varieties which are recognized by CAC but which are not collected as distinct issues by specialists.
The CAC total of 7 coins for Uncirculated 1845-O eagles includes four pieces graded MS61. It is my belief that this figure is inflated by resubmissions.

The total percentage of coins graded in Uncirculated (6.84%) is lower than for the last two series I examined for appearance rarity. To refresh your memory, these were Charlotte and Dahlonega half eagles, and the total percentage of coins graded in Uncirculated was as follows:

Charlotte half eagles: 14.54%
Dahlonega half eagles: 8.28%

Now, let’s look at some of the observations we can make from the CAC numbers listed above.

The five dates with the lowest total CAC populations are:

1859-O (4)
1857-O (7)
1841-O (8)
1855-O (10)
1856-O (12)

A few things jump out to me about this list.

The first is that the 1841-O is, in fact, significantly rarer than the 1857-O in terms of appearance rarity. If we drill down and look more closely at the numbers, we see that six of the eight total 1841-O eagles approved by CAC grade EF45 or lower. In comparison, six of the seven 1857-O eagles approved by CAC graded AU50 or finer. In my experience, the 1841-O is clearly a rarer date than the 1857-O, both in terms of overall and condition rarity.

The next thing I find interesting is the fact that the 1849-O and the 1852-O don’t qualify for the Top Five list. The 1849-O has a total population at CAC of 13 coins with just four grading AU50 or finer. In my experience, it is a rarer date in terms of its appearance rarity than the 1855-O or the 1856-O. The 1852-O just misses this list with a total of 14 coins approved by CAC. It is very close to the 1855-O and 1856-O in terms of its appearance rarity; a fact I noted in my recently published book. I could certainly see adding these two issues to the Top Five and replacing the 1855-O and 1856-O; these four dates are very similar in terms of overall and high grade rarity.

Is there anything surprising on the other end of the list? The five dates with the highest CAC populations are:

21. 1847-O (102)
20. 1851-O (99)
19. 1843-O (38)
18. 1844-O (34)
17. 1853-O (33)

It is interesting to note that the two most common dates (1847-O and 1851-O) have a combined CAC population of 201 coins. These means that 34.41% of all CAC approved eagles are these two dates. The impact of these two dates in Uncirculated is a bit less significant with 11 of the 40 coins approved by CAC (or 27.5%) being these two.

The other three dates are condition rarities. All have similar rarity profiles: common in grades through AU55 but rare in properly graded AU58 and extremely rare in Uncirculated.

Continuing to look at high grade populations, it is interesting to note that no fewer than nine different New Orleans No Motto eagles haven’t a single coin graded MS60 or finer approved by CAC. These are as follows: 1841-O, 1850-O, 1852-O, 1853-O, 1854-O Small Date, 1855-O, 1857-O, 1859-O and 1860-O.

In my experience, at least five of these dates either have no Uncirculated examples known or they have a single coin (or perhaps two to three) which aren’t likely to qualify for approval at CAC when—and if—they are submitted. These are the 1841-O, 1853-O, 1854-O Small Date, 1857-O, and 1859-O. The other four dates have at least one Uncirculated coin of which I am aware that is likely to qualify for approval at CAC when—and if—they are submitted.

There are a few dates whose overall CAC numbers surprised me.

The 1842-O is common in grades through EF45 but scarce in the lower AU grades and very rare in AU58 and finer. CAC has approved 19 in all, which is more than I would have expected. The 1845-O has a significantly lower overall population in circulated grades than I expected with just 13. This is a date which comes nice and I could swear that I’ve handled at least a dozen CAC-worthy coins over the years. The 1860-O is another date which surprises me. Thirteen of the 15 pieces which have been approved by CAC grade About Uncirculated. This date didn’t see much circulation and many of the AUs on the market are bright and lack the appearance preferred by CAC. There are as many as 10 known in Uncirculated including a few really nice MS62 to MS63 pieces. I’m very surprised that none have stickered at CAC.

Let’s wrap this article up by comparing the CAC rankings from top to bottom with the rankings in my book.

  
    DATE
    CAC RARITY
RANKING

    DW BOOK 
RANKING

  

    1841-O
    3
    2
  

    1842-O
    6
    12, tie
  

    1843-O
    19
    18
  

    1844-O
    18
    16
  

    1845-O
    10, tie
    14, tie
  

    1846-O
    12
    8
  

    1847-O
    21
    21
  

    1848-O
    15
    12, tie
  

    1849-O
    6
    6, tie
  

    1850-O
    10, tie
    10, tie
  

    1851-O
    20
    20
  

    1852-O
    7
    6, tie
  

    1853-O
    17
    19
  

    1854-O Sm. Dt.
    14
    10, tie
  

    1854-O Lg. Dt.
    16
    14, tie
  

    1855-O
    4
    3, tie
  

    1856-O
    5
    3, tie
  

    1857-O
    2
    3, tie
  

    1858-O
    13
    17
  

    1859-O
    1
    1
  

    1860-O
    8
    9
  

These findings show a good deal of similarity between the CAC figures and my findings. It should be remembered that I expressed overall rarity as a range (i.e. 65-75 coins) which led to many ties. The CAC numbers are not expressed as a range which means that a coin which I ranked as tied for third known with two other coins is very similar to a CAC figure which falls in this range.

Due to space limitations, I’m going to quit here but I’d like to add one suggestion to collectors who are interested in No Motto eagles from New Orleans. Given the rarity of Uncirculated coins, it makes sense to create rarity rankings for high grade coins using AU55 and AU58 as the parameters. As many more exist, it will give a truer sense to the rarity of these dates in what is essentially the best available grade(s).

No Motto New Orleans eagles are a great series to collect and it would be a real challenge to assemble a high grade set which features all CAC approved coins.

Would you like to build a set of CAC approved New Orleans No Motto eagles? Contact Doug Winter via email (dwn@ont.com) and discuss the options which are available to you. Doug has written the standard reference work on New Orleans gold and he works closely with collectors whether they are buying a $2,000 1847-O eagle in AU55 or a $75,000 finest known New Orleans eagle.