1887 Morgan Dollars 1878-1921 MS63

History

The Morgan dollar series began with the Bland-Allison Act, passed over President Rutherford B. Hayes's veto on February 28, 1878, which obliged the Treasury to buy silver each month for coinage into standard dollars. The overdate exists because the Philadelphia Mint prepared more than one pair of overdated Morgan dollar dies in 1887, keeping one pair for its own use and shipping another to New Orleans, so a single year produced distinct overdate varieties at two mints. Overdated Morgan dies were not new in 1887; the 1880 issues include overdate variants from all four dollar-striking mints. Ted Clark reported the Philadelphia 1887/6 in November 1971, and identification of the New Orleans counterpart followed shortly afterward, generally credited to Bob Riethe.

Details

George T. Morgan designed both sides. Struck at the New Orleans Mint with an O mintmark, the coin is 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper, containing roughly 0.7734 troy ounce of silver. No separate mintage figure exists, since the overdate is a die variety within the regular 1887-O production run and the number of pieces struck from the overdated die pair went unrecorded. At least one obverse and one reverse die are recorded for the variety, with the underlying 1886 date coming from the Even 6 logotype.

Features

The obverse carries Liberty facing left in a Phrygian cap with LIBERTY on the headband, E PLURIBUS UNUM around the periphery, thirteen stars and the date below. On the reverse, an eagle holds an olive branch and arrows within UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and ONE DOLLAR, with IN GOD WE TRUST above and the O mintmark below the wreath. The variety is catalogued as VAM-3 and Breen-5597 and is one of the Top 100 Morgan dollar varieties; NGC attributes it as 1887/6 O TOP-100 VAM-3, while PCGS carries it under both a legacy number and a separate number for the explicit VAM-3 attribution, which splits census and price data between the two. The underdate on the New Orleans coin is weaker than on the Philadelphia 1887/6 and becomes very faint in later die states, so early die impressions are the ones worth pursuing.

Notable facts

• PCGS characterizes surviving examples as usually About Uncirculated or worse, with Uncirculated pieces mostly mediocre and no prooflike examples reported.
• Because the variety has never been widely publicized, many ordinary 1887-O dollars in collections are likely unattributed overdates.
• Interest in the overdate was slight at first and rose sharply after the Van Allen-Mallis catalog and, later, the Fivaz-Stanton guide brought it to wider attention.
• The New Orleans Mint struck coins in two periods, 1838 to 1861 and 1879 to 1909.
• The House overrode the Hayes veto of the Bland-Allison Act by 196 to 73 and the Senate by 46 to 19, both on February 28, 1878.
• Many collectors treat the 1887/6 as a distinct date deserving a place in a basic Morgan dollar set rather than as a specialist variety.