Owner Comments:
The first year's coins were minted in high relief with the date in roman numerals. After striking 11,250 coins in high relief the design was modified and the relief lowered so that production could be done on high speed presses. The date was also changed from roman numerals to standard date numerals. This change in relief and date format were the only changes to the design throughout the years of production.
In the 1940's the US government decided that because it had been decided that the entire production of 1933 Saints were to be melted and not distributed that the handful of coins that were in collector's hands had to be surrendered to the government. This has led to some high-profile court cases in recent years.
A coin from my collection housed in a rare generation 2 NGC holder. The biggest difference between the two gen 2 holders is that for this holder the foil logo is printed inside the plastic shell. The other gen 2 holder has the reverse logo embossed on the outside of the shell, this unfortunately made it very easy for the logo to be damaged from handling and dealer stickers. In his book Conder101 called this slab gen 2.1, however, it was latter reviled that this version of the gen 2 holder likely should have been listed as gen 2.0 and was really the first of the second generation holder style that NGC used. As I wrote in the description for the gen 2.0 holder, Conder101 reports both the gen 2 holders were only used for a month or less in December of 1987. However, given the number of examples that are known to exist I think the timeframe that the gen 2 holders were used by NGC was longer than reported by Conder101.
I purchased this coin at the ANA show that was held in Phoenix AZ in the spring of 2023. A dealer that I was unfamiliar with was setup at the show and had several gen 2.0 and 2.1 NGC slabs. I have wanted an example of both for some time and was really intrigued at the thought of adding one or the other when I saw his case. Most of his other coins were late date WLH's which would have been a bit less than this Saint. But the idea of a large gold coin over the silver half's was more enticing and a deal was struck.
I wish I had been smarter and purchased an example of this style of holder earlier in my collecting journey, it would have saved me a lot of money, lol. Of course, early on I was focused more on completing series and collections and not even thinking about the history of slabs themselves.