Rare Coins That Brought In A Massive Payday On Pawn Stars

According to CDN Publishing, publisher of the Greysheet currency pricing guide (since 1963), the U.S. rare coin market had an estimated value of over $6 billion in 2022. This was buoyed by $560 million worth of public auction sales and hundreds of millions of dollars in private sales through companies like Dallas-based Heritage Auctions, the third-largest auction house in the world. While not all the numbers for private dealers were disclosed in CDN Publishing's release, it did reveal that Heritage Auctions sold $347 million worth of rare coins on its own in 2022, while Stack's Bowers, the oldest rare coin dealer and auction house in the U.S., sold $131 million worth in the same year. While this gives us an idea of how well some private auction companies did, it doesn't account for foreign or ancient coins sold at auction.

You can thank shows like "Pawn Stars" for shining a light on highly coveted coins worth a ton of money today, as well as for increasing the general public's awareness of why. For instance, not every rare coin becomes a collector's item for reasons like lack of general interest and obscurity. That said, there have been some stratospheric sales on "Pawn Stars." Here are a few of the biggest paydays for sellers on the show.

CoinWeek reports the Philadelphia Mint produced a limited run of 1922 high-relief matte Peace dollars based on the 1921 Peace dollar die, which had produced 1,006,473 Peace dollars over three days between December 28 and 31. The outlet reports the 1922 dollars were perhaps struck in December, but no later than January 8, 1922.

When a customer who had won one of these coins in a poker game walked into the Gold & Silver Pawn Shop in Las Vegas, the establishment where the "Pawn Stars" show takes place, the owner and star of the show, Rick Harrison, called the coin "one of the holy grails of American coins." Incredibly, the customer initially low-balled himself by asking for $20,000 for the coin. Harrison knew it was worth much more.

After calling in expert coin grader David Vagi to appraise the coin, the coin was confirmed to be worth five figures, saying the coin was "north of 50 but less than a hundred." Harrison bought the 1922 coin for $80,000, and it was later sold in January 2015 (a month after the episode aired) for $99,875.

The 1781 Libertas Americana medal, which commemorates America's independence in July 1776, and France's alliance with the United States following victories at Saratoga in 1777 and at Yorktown in 1781, was commissioned by Benjamin Franklin in 1782 and produced in 1783. One customer on "Pawn Stars" found out in the best possible way how selling such rare coins could equal winning the lottery.

The customer actually had two rare and historic coins to sell to Rick Harrison in Season 15 of "Pawn Stars" (which was filmed between 2017 and 2018): a 1781 Libertas and a 1792 half disme. Harrison got Jeff Garett, the owner of Mid-American Rare Coin Gallery, to assess the coins' values. Garrett estimated the Libertas to be worth $200,000, while the half disme had a value of $500,000 and $600,000. After a tough negotiation over the 1781 Libertas, where the offer oscillated between $140,000 and $180,000, an agreement was made at $150,000. As per a listing of past auction sales on Stack's Bowers site, a silver Libertas medal sold for $336,000 in August 2024.

While it turns out that modern day American pennies cost more to make than they're worth, finding a 1652 New England shilling between the folds of your couch would be well worth its weight in gold. The shilling was the equivalent of 12 pence or 12 pennies, and as highlighted by Rck Harrison in the Season 17 "Pawn Stars" episode, were the first coins the U.S. ever produced after the Massachusetts General Court authorized the minting of silver coins in the 13 colonies.

Harrison rarely travels outside of his pawnshop to discover hidden treasure, but he did for this historic coin, traveling from Las Vegas to meet seller, Ed, in Boston. Ed, unlike the other coin sellers on this list, researched recent sales of similar coins, which informed his asking price of $300,000 based on auction sales averaging between $250,000 and $400,000. In the end, Harrison bought the shilling for $250,000. According to Stack's Bowers, a 1652 New England shilling sold in 2022 for $312,000, so around the midpoint of what Ed had cited in the (2019/2020) episode.