1899 Liberty Head $5 Half Eagle

1899 Liberty Head half eagles were produced at the Philadelphia and San Francisco (S). Both mints produced a roughly equal number of business-strike coins, with the Philadelphia Mint striking a slightly larger quantity of coins than the San Francisco Mint.

Here’s a breakdown of the mintages and values of 1899 $5 Liberty Head half eagle gold coins:

• 1899, 1,710,630 minted; $700

• 1899-S, 1,545,000; $700

• 1899 proof, 99; $12,500

*Values are for coins grading Very Fine 20 unless otherwise stated.

While slightly more 1899 $5 gold half eagles were made at the Philadelphia Mint than the San Francisco Mint, collectors shouldn’t get much hung up over trifling differences like that in mintage figures, especially when it comes to pre-1933 U.S. gold coins. Many of the coins reflected in the mintage figures above have long since been melted, meaning the existing number of 1899 half eagles today is much lower than what is shown here.

Christian Gobrecht designed 1899 Liberty Head half eagles, which measure 21.6 millimeters wide and contain 0.24187 ounces of gold. Interestingly, Gobrecht also designed the silver Seated Liberty coinage that was in production from the late 1830s through the early 1890s.