Circa 1793 Washington Success Token. Small Size. Musante GW-44 var. Baker-Unlisted, Breen-1292, DeWitt-unlisted. Silvered Brass. Scalloped edge. Choice Extremely Fine.

18.6 mm. 32.1 grains. Uniform deep gray surfaces with very slight granularity visible under close inspection. Light ancient abrasions over the all-seeing eye but without other imperfections worthy of mention. A distinctive example for its broadly scalloped edge treatment that was long believed to be unique, as noted by Walter Breen, who further stated that it was owned by Virgil Brand and later handled by New Netherlands and George Fuld before it was sold in the Roper 2nd Collection sale, as lot 409. Curiously, George Fuld did not mention it in his reissue of the Baker reference in 1965, nor was it clearly mentioned in the Rulau-Fuld version, though there is mention of a "scalloped edge" which is defined therein as the "peculiarly reeded edge" normal to the Baker-267 variant. This being the case, we are not too confident in the more extended provenance and have elected to instead cite only the Roper sale appearance where it was also sold as "unique." Both major grading services declined to grade this piece, as there was a seemingly insurmountable lack of clarity as to its true nature due to the unusual edge and composition. In recent years, Neil Musante has published another very similar piece, plated in his reference, Medallic Washington, on page 101. That was reported to be in the Smithsonian collection. It would seem that with at least two scalloped examples in existence, this variety is more than a curiosity and is a legitimate, rare, and highly collectable variety of the small Success medal.

From the E Pluribus Unum Collection. Earlier from our (Stack's) sale of the John L. Roper, 2nd Collection, December 1983, lot 409.