$10 million worth of gold coins found.

markj113 said:
A Northern California couple out walking their dog on their Gold Country property stumbled across a modern-day bonanza: $10 million in rare, mint-condition gold coins buried in the shadow of an old tree.

Nearly all of the 1,427 coins, dating from 1847 to 1894, are in uncirculated, mint condition, said David Hall, co-founder of Professional Coin Grading Service of Santa Ana, which recently authenticated them. Although the face value of the gold pieces only adds up to about $27,000, some of them are so rare that coin experts say they could fetch nearly $1 million apiece.

"I don't like to say once-in-a-lifetime for anything, but you don't get an opportunity to handle this kind of material, a treasure like this, ever," said veteran numismatist Don Kagin, who is representing the finders. "It's like they found the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow."


http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/02/2...-million-in-rare-coins-while-out-walking-dog/

lucky gits :)
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Well it has to be said...... well that's just gold!
 
Clawhammer said:
10million in NUMISMATIC value.

good luck getting 1/3 of that on the market.
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I hope someone gives them better advice than what's in the article -

They plan to put most of the coins up for sale through Amazon while holding onto a few keepsakes.
 
Theories as to how the coins got there?

Bank robbery, hiding the loot.
 
Byron said:
Theories as to how the coins got there?

Bank robbery, hiding the loot.
Click to expand...


If you read the article you would know this is not possible. They are all in the tins in chronological order.

It was a collector. Either he added a new coin to the tins each year, and then reburied, or he took his collection and put them all carefully into tins for burial.

I am more interested in why he was never able to return and dig them up - or how long they were there fore. Surely he must have had family he could have told about them on his death bed. So I presume he died accidentally or suddenly.

//EDIT TO ADD//

Got me thinking! lol

The coins cover a 47 year period, so on average someone placed just over 30 coins per year into the tins, just under 3 per month. (2.5 per month) That is a lot of collecting! I reckon someone was putting a few new coins out of his pay packet into tins every couple of months as a personal banking thing. But every few months for 47 years? Nah! That suddenly makes no sense. The average life expectancy in 1840 was 40 yrs, and was still below 50 yrs by 1900.

Needs more thinking

Because these are unc condition, there is no way they were all burri3ed at once. EG by the time the later coins were deposited the early ones would have been warn.

What a cool mistery!
 
Shamatti said:
Byron said:
Theories as to how the coins got there?

Bank robbery, hiding the loot.
Click to expand...


If you read the article you would know this is not possible. They are all in the tins in chronological order.

It was a collector. Either he added a new coin to the tins each year, and then reburied, or he took his collection and put them all carefully into tins for burial.

I am more interested in why he was never able to return and dig them up - or how long they were there fore. Surely he must have had family he could have told about them on his death bed. So I presume he died accidentally or suddenly.

//EDIT TO ADD//

Got me thinking! lol

The coins cover a 47 year period, so on average someone placed just over 30 coins per year into the tins, just under 3 per month. (2.5 per month) That is a lot of collecting! I reckon someone was putting a few new coins out of his pay packet into tins every couple of months as a personal banking thing. But every few months for 47 years? Nah! That suddenly makes no sense. The average life expectancy in 1840 was 40 yrs, and was still below 50 yrs by 1900.

Needs more thinking

Because these are unc condition, there is no way they were all burri3ed at once. EG by the time the later coins were deposited the early ones would have been warn.

What a cool mistery!
Click to expand...

I'm leaning towards robbery esp after this article about an insider stealing similar amounts of gold in San Fran:

http://www.usmint.gov/kids/coinnews/mintfacilities/sfo/#thieves
 
Byron said:
I'm leaning towards robbery esp after this article about an insider stealing similar amounts of gold in San Fran:

http://www.usmint.gov/kids/coinnews/mintfacilities/sfo/#thieves
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Considerations:

"By April of 1854, a new facility had been built and its coin presses began turning miners' gold into coins."

But the found coins are dated from 1847

"Although most of the coins were minted in San Francisco, one $5 gold piece came from as far away as Georgia."

"....found him guilty of stealing the $30,000 in gold double eagles....."

It is not stated that every coin found was a double eagle, but I got this of Wiki.

1866-S $20 Double Eagle/no motto valued at around $1 million
1866-S $20 Double Eagle/with motto PCGS MS62+ (finest known)
1873 $20 Double Eagle (Closed 3) graded MS62 (tied finest known)
1877-S $20 Double Eagle PCGS MS65 (tied finest known)
1888-S $20 Double Eagle (four) PCGS MS64 (tied for finest known)
1889-S $20 Double Eagle (two) graded PCGS MS65 (tied for finest known)
1894-S $20 Double Eagle PCGS MS65 (tied for finest known)

A total of 1,373 were $20 coins, 50 were $10 coins and four were $5 coins. They were dated from 1847 to 1894, [....] Most were minted in San Francisco.

Not sure that the find matches the theft that closely, by coin denomination and type tough. Did they even mint $5 Double Eagles?

1,500 coins were said to be stolen, 1,427 were found. So it's close enough. One presumes he spent some before getting caught?


I'd say it was feasible. But not confirmed!
 
Good job reporting the find lol, now every scammer and con artist in the US is after them and don't forget about the taxman.
Loose lips sink ships!
 
goldpelican said:
Four threads merged.
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6 months later I had a laugh reading this.

He should have informed a relative. Or more.
He chosed to not do so. That's a message on itself.
Maybe he preferred an unknown finder rather than relatives :P

And another maybe is that he hadn't any relatives. Well, he had then little reason to care where his stack would end, no?
It's what it is: a choice.
Just suppose that he did put them in a bank.
And then he dies.
What would the bank do with it?
They may have (partly) ended up at the relatives he decided to not make aware.
They may have (totally) ended up at... take a guess here.
 
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