Ebay purchase of a Hamilton Mint silver art bar

I won an ebay auction for 1-oz silver art bar on May 24, 2009. I received it in the mail today. Here are some pics:







I took these pictures using my HP DeskJet F300 All-In-One Scanner/Printer/Copier.

On the 3rd pic, I had to darken it to get the writing on the reverse side of the bar to become a little more legible. That is the best I can do with that 3rd pic.

Note: I always weigh my ebay silver purchases using a digital scale. This silver art bar came in at 30.6 grams which is under weight, however, there is a 0.1 - 0.5 gram variance when it comes to the weight of 1-oz 1970's silver art bars. That is especially true for 1-oz '70's silver art bars that were minted by the Ceeco Mint and the Madison Mint. That is not a red flag in this case. This silver bar passed the silver "ring" test so I am not worried about it.

I paid $16.61 for this silver art bar (spot silver was $14.69/oz at the time that I won this ebay auction). The shipping was free.

It is a 1974 Hamilton Mint "Cherry Blossoms of the Potomac" silver art bar. This 1-oz silver bar was part of the "America the Beautiful" series. The "America The Beautiful" series was minted in the years 1974 and 1975 by the Hamilton Mint. The side of the bar has a serial number on it. The serial number is 2766.

Overall, the ebay transaction went smoothly and there were no issues with the ebay seller or with this silver art bar. IMO it is rare on ebay to find and win an auction for a 1970's silver art bar for $1.92 over spot silver. I am very happy with my purchase.

 

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I forgot to mention that there are several other 1-oz Hamilton Mint silver art bars in the "America the Beautiful" series. I believe the purpose of these silver art bars is to show slices of America by showing certain landscapes and parts of American life IMO. I plan to collect more of these Hamilton Mint "America of the Beautiful" silver art bars in the future. I also believe that all of these 1-oz Hamilton mint silver art bars have serial numbers on them. These are beautiful silver art bars IMO.

 

That is rather lovely :bow:

 

First of all your bar is a beauty
The bar comes indeed from a 50 bar set called 'america the beautiful' and was minted in the years 1974 and 1975. Each bar exists in the 1 oz .999 silver version and in the 1 Oz .999 silver gold plated version.

Your bar is bar 3/50 identified as: 'HAM-480 Cherry Blossom of Potomac'.
It was minted in 1974 at a mintage of 10.000 bars.
And like you said, all the bars from this set are serialized on the side of the bar.

 

Thanks Orpheus72 for that information. Especially the mintage numbers. I did not know the mintage was ten thousand bars. I like the "America the Beautiful" series the best out of all of the series that the Hamilton Mint produced.

 

No problem.
I like Hamilton's 'the ten commandments' set a bit more, as it was only minted at 250 bars.

 

I am glad to see there are people still collecting art bars. I was told by a dealer that it is a thing of the past and nobody collects them anymore.
I have a couple dozen put away and don't really know what to do with them.

 

Most local coin dealers in my area treat 1970's 1-oz .999 silver art bars like regular .999 generic silver bullion. They are priced the same as regular .999 silver. That's why most of the time I prefer to buy them locally at coin shops and coin shows. I can usually get them for $1.50-$3 over spot silver when I buy them locally. I got lucky with this ebay auction win because it was late Sunday night during the Memorial Day weekend. Most people were either asleep or doing other things on a Sunday night during the Memorial day weekend. It worked out really well for me and I am very happy with my ebay purchase.

If you like them I would hold on to them.

If you wanted to sell them then depending on what type of '70's art bars that you have, you can get quite a bit money for them on ebay. You could always sell them at a local dealer but that local dealer will give spot minus a small discount. I would look on ebay to get an idea on what your 70's art bars will sell for on a regular week. Holidays are not good examples because there are not many people on ebay during the holidays.

I hope this helps.

 

Actually I do find them unique and attractive. They were included in an estate collection I purchased. I have the Boston tea party,
the General steam locomotive, the Model T Ford, Babe Ruth, and many others. I see them listed on eBay for moon money; $50 or more each.
Do people really pay that kind of money?

 

People do pay that much money for them. It is the rarity value of those bars that is causing those silver bars to fetch that kind of price on ebay. I might possibly be wrong on this but I think the Boston Tea Party silver art bar was minted by USSC (United States Silver Corp.) in 1973, The General Steam Locomotive was minted by Madison Mint in 1972, and I think that the Model T Ford was minted by the Patrick Mint in 1973. I might be wrong on some of this because I do not have a Archie Kidd silver art bar price guide yet. I am not sure about The Babe Ruth silver art bar. I do not know what mint produced that silver bar.

I plan to keep all of my 1970's 1-oz silver art bars. I like mine very much. It is fun to collect these silver art bars. I plan to buy more 1970's silver art bars in the future.

 

They can be from several mints, (ex: Boston tea party 1 Oz .999 silver was struck 7 different mints !).

Prices af an art bar really depends on their beauty and the mintage number, and for the most bars it's general spot silver price + $3 / $5. For the RARE bars (mintages from 10 to 250 bars) the value depends on the collectors. (over here in Europe people say :'It's worth what the fool will pay for it' )

 

Yes you are correct. At least for the ones i own. i matched mine up with eBay listings to get the info. and took notes. The Tea party bar is catalog number USSC-159 [1973] with a rarity 5. it was listed on eBay for $49.95.
That one now sits in an airtite.
The "General" [1972] Madison Mint has a rarity value of $15 over spot.
I was wondering how to go about selling them at these prices? I do not want to give eBay or Paypal a cut so eBay isn't the answer.

 

Babe Ruth

This one is dated 1973. "Americas Baseball Great" 1895-1948 It's made by the Manhattan Private Mint and says on it "American Folk heros".
Any idea as to value?

 

The bar you describe is minted by the Mount Everest Mint for 'The Manhattan Private Mint'. It is identified as 'MEM-25 Babe Ruth' minted in 1973 in a mintage of 1578 bars. According the 'price guide' it has a rarity value of $25.

 

Thanks

Thank you. It does have the initials MEM on it. By rarity value do you mean $25 total or $25 over spot?

 

I think that means $25 over spot. So in this case, since spot is currently about $15.75/oz, that would mean a total value of $40.75 when you factor in the rarity value.

 

The Rarity value is additional to the spot silver price, but I personally don't think you get the actual price if you follow the books prices. Some bars will have a higher, others a lower value. It's all depending on how many people are searching for a particular bar.

 

Well thanks guys. I'm glad you two are on here today. I recently bought a fairly large collection from a lady at work. I knew her husband too [the collector]. But I bought it for the Morgans, the Walkers and Franklins mostly.
I paid her a nice fair amount and didn't gyp her. The 2 dozen or so art bars included were mostly all marked with a price tag of $7.50 so I doubled that and gave her about $15 each. I think the guy really did pay $7.50 each years ago.

 

I agree with that because supply and demand will ultimately decide what the value for that art bar will be on ebay. I have seen certain silver art bars bars that I thought would go for more actually went for much less after the auction ended. I also think that ebay seller competition also plays an important role as well. There might be several ebay sellers selling the same silver art bar at different BIN prices and that ebay seller with the lowest BIN price (all other things being equal) will usually get the sale.

I do not plan to sell my '70's silver art bar collection because I just love the art bars that I have but I will lurk on ebay 1-2 days a week to get an idea of what certain '70's silver art bars will go on ebay and to also get more information from the ebay description about a particular '70's silver art bar. That is how I have been able to identify certain '70's silver art bars when I buy them from a local coin show or at a coin shop in my area.

I would also like to thank you orpheus72 for providing additional information about the mintage numbers on the Hamilton Mint silver art bar that I won on ebay.

I will keep these 1970's silver art bars for a very long time (forever!!!) because it took hard work for me to find and buy these locally and online at the right prices. I love these '70's silver art bars a lot.

 

You are welcome. I feel happy that I was able to be of some help to you. It is a lot of fun to collect 1-oz 1970's silver art bars IMO.