The Philadelphia mint began producing the familiar Liberty Head half eagle design in 1839. After a quick modification in 1840, this issue continued without change until 1866 when the motto IN GOD WE TRUST was added to the reverse. The branch mint No Motto half eagles from the 1840’s are very popular with collectors. But their Philadelphia counterparts have lagged behind, both in price and level of demand.   
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The date run of half eagles produced at the San Francisco mint from 1858 through 1864 includes some of the rarest and most overlooked gold issues ever manufactured at any of the various branch mints. These were issues that had limited production runs and which were eagerly absorbed into commerce by the booming local and regional economies.   
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In my last blog, I wrote about a Gem 1855-C half eagle that I was fortunate to recently handle. A number of readers asked me about some of the other Gem half eagles from this mint and I thought it would be interesting to take a look at each of these. There are a total of eight Charlotte half eagles that have been graded MS65 or better by either PCGS or NGC (or by both services in some cases).   
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A few months ago, I decided to start focusing more on No Motto half eagles and eagles from the Philadelphia mint than I had in the past. Formerly, I had sort of pooh-poohed these coins as being “boring” but the more I’ve studied these series, the more I think they may be one of the true Final Frontiers of the rare date gold market. As a buyer, one of my major criteria for making a purchase is the fundamental rarity of a coin.   
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If you are a regular reader of my blogs, it’s a pretty safe assumption that you are interested in United States gold coins. And if you like U.S.gold, I don’t think I’m going too far out on a limb to state that you probably like to see photos of and read about special pieces.   
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In this economy, everyone likes a good value. If you don’t have the discretionary funds for coins now that you had a year ago, every last dollar counts. This brings us to the question at hand. Are there good values in the rare gold market in the $5,000 and under price range? And if so, what are they? This article is focused on twelve of the better values that come to mind in the gold dollar through half eagle denominations.   
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