1877 Brunk L-453 R.I. Lomas Dollar

Coin Details

Description

This 1877 bears a merchant counterstamp attributed to R.I. Lomas, cataloged as Brunk L-453. Counterstamps were applied to circulating coins by merchants, silversmiths, and tradesmen as a form of portable advertising — the business card of early America. The R.I. Lomas stamp identifies a business operating in Lomas, one of many merchants who used coin counterstamping to advertise their trade. The host coin is a 1877 dollar from the Trade Dollars 1873-1885 series. The host coin's original mintage was 3.0 million, though counterstamped examples represent only a tiny fraction of survivors. Cataloged as PCGS #545360. Counterstamped coins documented in Gregory G. Brunk's "American and Canadian Countermarked Coins" sit at the intersection of numismatics and Americana — each piece is a primary-source historical document of early American commerce. The counterstamp adds a unique layer of provenance that distinguishes this coin from all other examples of its type.