Tell-It-Like-It-Is: $1 coin, now worth $1.2 million, was hoarded in 1794

$1 coin: Americans have hoarded $1 coins since the early years of the Republic.

This mint condition 1794 Flowing Hair $1 coin sold for $1.2 million at Bowers and Merena's Boston Rarities Sale on Aug. 7. Only 140 of America's first silver $1 coins are believed to exist.

And there's a reason for their scarcity: Even back in the first years of the Republic, people hoarded dollar coins rather than spend them.
The story goes that on Oct. 15, 1794, chief coiner Henry Voigt coined 1,758 of the silver dollars and delivered them to David Rittenhouse, director of the US Mint, according to the Smithsonian Museum of American History. He handed them out as gifts to dignitaries. In all likelihood, fewer Americans saw those silver dollars than today's Sacagawea and presidential $1 coins, which occasionally pop up in circulation.
Back then, Americans often relied on foreign coins that circulated around the young nation for dollar equivalents. Only 140 of the so-called Flowing Hair silver dollars are thought to exist. (The coins depict a woman with long flowing hair).
The $1 coin that sold in Boston to an anonymous bidder was considered the fourth best specimen of the six mint 1794 silver dollars known to exist. The best specimen, called the Neil/Carter/Contursi 1794 Flowing Hair silver dollar, sold for nearly $7.9 million in May, setting a new record price for a coin.