1907 $10 Indian (1907 Indian Eagle) NGC MS67. This outstanding Indian 1907 Eagle shimmers with mint luster. The surfaces are virtually pristine, in keeping with the grade. A microscopic dot or two keep it from an even higher mint state grade. Because of some slight weakness in the lower feather and center of the obverse, the strike average on that side. However, eagles of this date usually have central weakness on both the obverse and reverse. The present coin is unusual in that the reverse is full and sharply struck.

Responding to President Theodore Roosevelts request, sculptor, designer Augustus Saint-Gaudens created a new gold eagle. Saint-Gaudens, Roosevelts personal friend for years, had designed Roosevelts inaugural medal, and the new president was very happy with his work. For the new eagle, Saint-Gaudens chose the Indian Princess design. It had a Caucasian Miss Liberty wearing an Indian feathered war bonnet. While to the modern eye this combination is somewhat absurd, in 1907 it was considered innovative. Roosevelt felt that the contemporary United States coinage was atrociously hideous, and Saint-Gaudens agreed. An idealized Native American war bonnet was used to give the coin a distinctly nationalistic character. Because of its use, the coin wound up being known as the Indian Head Eagle. Saint-Gaudens used as his model the figure of Nike, which was part of his sculpture of the Sherman Monument at the entrance to New Yorks Central Park. Thirteen stars are seen in an arc above the head, and the date is below the truncation of the neck. The reverse of the coin shows a magnificent standing eagle, reminiscent of Egyptian designs. It is standing on a log with arrows and an olive branch in its talons. In an arc above it are the words UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. Below the eagle is the written denomination, TEN DOLLARS and above its wings is the motto E PLURIBUS UNUM. Instead of a reeded edge, there are forty-six raised stars on the edge, which represented the states of the union at the time.

Augustus Saint-Gaudens was born in Ireland, the son of a shoemaker. He became one of Americas most successful sculptors of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In 1848, his family moved from Dublin to New York before his first birthday. When he was thirteen, Saint-Gaudens left school and became an apprentice to a cameo cutter. He also took classes at Cooper Union and the National Academy of Design. When he was nineteen, he moved to Europe where he studied classical art and architecture.

His first commission was a statue of Admiral Farragut that is still in Madison Square Park in New York. By the 1890s Saint-Gaudens had produced his statues of Diana and Abraham Lincoln, both considered some of his greatest works. He also created works such as the Robert Gould Shaw Memorial on Boston Common and the equestrian monument to Civil War general John A. Logan in Chicago. He became part of a group of new artists and architects and worked for an architectural firm for whom he produced a group of monuments and decorative sculpture. Throughout his career, he worked with architects creating works that were designed specifically for the sites they were building. At the entrance to New Yorks Central Park is his bronze statue of General Sherman led by Victory. It took him eleven years to complete this project.

Saint-Gaudens moved to his summer home in Cornish, New Hampshire in 1900. Joined there by a community of artists, Saint-Gaudens spent his final years. He died of stomach cancer in 1907 just after he created the beautiful high relief models for the eagle and double eagle coins.

The 1907 Indian Head Eagle No Periods (before or after E PLURIBUS UNUM) coins had an original mintage of 239,406. Of the 5,637 coins certified by NGC, there are 29 in MS67 condition with only 2 better. PCGS has 6 in MS67 with only 1 better. These numbers do not account for resubmissions or crossovers.