CACG Certifies the Finest Known 1794 Flowing Hair Dollar as Mint State 67

A 1794 Flowing Hair silver dollar, sold at auction "raw" as Gem Brilliant Uncirculated by Stack’s in 1995, has now been closely examined by experts at CAC Grading (www.CACgrading.com) who certified it as Mint State 67.

A 1794 Flowing Hair silver dollar, graded Mint State 67 by CAC Grading and insured for $15 million, may make its first public appearance in 30 years during 2025.

The coin was struck during the first year the United States Mint produced dollar coins for circulation. Mint records show that Chief Coiner Henry Voigt delivered a total of 1,758 silver dollars to Mint Director David Rittenhouse on October 15, 1794, which was the entire mintage of 1794-dated Flowing Hair dollars released for the year.

"Less than 150 1794 silver dollars are known to exist today, and only a handful are certified Mint State. The Lelan Rogers coin, owned for decades by a Georgia collector and now graded CACG MS67, is the finest known," said CAC Grading President Ron Drzewucki.

The coin was sold at auction "raw" as Gem Brilliant Uncirculated by Stack’s in 1995. It was later graded by PCGS as MS66+ and given a CAC sticker of approval.

"I’ve been kicking myself ever since it received only a green CAC approval sticker rather than a gold sticker. I can certainly understand an eight-figure valuation in this market," said Albanese.

After being purchased at the 1995 auction by dealer Jay Parrino for $577,500, the coin was sold in 1996 by Parrino and his partner Mike Phillips to dealer Chris Napolitano on behalf of his client, a collector in Georgia who still owns it and wants to remain anonymous under the set registry name "Stellar."

"The Lelan Rogers 1794 dollar is the absolute best 1794 dollar; the best 1794 dollar in existence," stated Phillips.

The coin was recently submitted to CAC for crossover, where a coin is removed from another third-party certification service’s sealed holder, examined, and, if appropriate, certified and encapsulated by another service.

According to Napolitano, his customer "was certainly happy about the results" and had expected CAC to grade the coin MS67.

"It validated what he felt about the dollar over all these years. Since I first saw this coin at Stack’s in 1995, I felt it was one of the most important U.S. coins in existence. In fact, at the time, I said that if I could own only one U.S. coin, this would be the one. That still holds true today," Napolitano stated.

"My client has never publicly displayed the coin during the nearly 30 years he has owned it. We know there’s a whole generation of numismatists who have never had the opportunity to view the coin. In fact, many may not be aware of its existence at all. We don’t have any specific dates or venues to announce at this time, but we will discuss the possibility of displaying the coin in the future," he revealed.

The 1995 Stack’s auction description of the coin reads:

"1794 Bolender 1. Gem Brilliant Uncirculated. 416.1 grains. A gorgeous toned satin gem coin. Both sides are toned a lovely, deep coin silver gray with iridescent champagne and palest iridescent blue around the rims. The fields are fully lustrous and satiny, the frost virtually unmarred by signs of handling. One has to wonder how such a big and heavy coin could have survived for 200 years with such satiny surfaces intact."

Several leading early American federal coinage experts who spoke with CAC Grading about the coin unanimously agreed on its exceptional quality, including Joe O’Connor.

"When we all first saw the Lelan Rogers 1794 dollar almost thirty years ago, it was clear then that this was not only one of the finest examples of the Flowing Hair Dollar type, but also likely the finest 1794. Three decades later, our collective opinion has not changed," O’Connor declared.

Albanese and two dozen veteran numismatists founded Certified Acceptance Corporation (CAC) in 2007 to provide buyers and sellers verification that their coins certified by third-party grading services met stringent standards. In 2022, he and Drzewucki organized over 150 leading members of the numismatic community to expand their mission for accuracy and consistency by creating a new third-party grading and encapsulation service, CAC Grading, that was launched in 2023.