1912 $5 Indian Head Half Eagle NGC MS65

Here is a beautiful gem state example of the dramatic Indian Head $5 half Eagle coin crafted by artist Bela Lyon Pratt. NGC has awarded the grade of MS65 to 43 examples of the 1912 $5, with a mere 4 finer. Collectors Universe gives this issue a price of $15,000.00 in MS65. Gold specialist David Akers writes, "Almost without exception, the 1912 is very sharply struck with very good to excellent lustre, usually the latter. The surfaces are granular and the color is most often a light to medium yellow gold ...[The 1912] is very similar in overall rarity to the other Philadelphia Mint issues from 1909 to 1913 ...."

Bela Lyon Pratt, the artist-engraver who created the Indian head half eagle and quarter eagle designs.

Noted numismatic scholar and art critic Cornelius Vermeule writes, "Bela Lyon Pratt of Boston presented a novel coin.... an Indian brave in war bonnet adorns the obverse, and [a] Ptolemaic eagle with wings closed walks along on the reverse...The innovations [on this coin] was one of technique as much as design. Instead of being modeled in relief within a protecting rim, the Indian, the eagle, and the lettering were sunken in incuse or engraved in the uniformly flat plane of the coin .... the [coin shows] more imagination and daring of design than almost any other issue in American history." This series was struck from 1908 through 1929.