Gold coins struck at Georgia’s Dahlonega Mint are a popular specialty area for collectors and many have low mintages and poor striking characteristics that make it a challenging specialty.

Heritage Auction’s offering of The Poulos Family Collection at its recent Long Beach Expo auctions in California presented  an opportunity for two rare issues at, again, relatively affordable prices. 

A 1854-D Indian Head gold $3 piece graded Extremely Fine Details, Obverse Repaired, Improperly Cleaned, by Numismatic Conservation Services comes from a tiny mintage of 1,120. Heritage wrote, “This accessible example maintains the sharpness of an XF coin, but the obverse shows signs of smoothing and both sides have been cleaned.” Despite the problems it brought $10,800.  

The tiny size of the Indian Head, Small Head gold dollar means that even small problems can have a glaring visual impact. The collection’s 1855-D dollar graded Numismatic Guaranty Corp. About Uncirculated Details, Repaired, Cleaned, is one of perhaps 80 remaining from a mintage of 1,811. 

Heritage observes, “The left obverse field is smoothed, the surfaces are a bit bright, and we note a diagonal mark on the cheekbone and a horizontal mark above the DO in DOLLAR.” It realized $4,080.

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