Home U.S. Coin Forum

Jefferson Nickel Variety of the Week - 1943-P/P RPM-069, RPM Question for you all on this one.

BigDowgieBigDowgie Posts: 1,749 ✭✭✭✭
edited April 17, 2019 3:49PM in U.S. Coin Forum

I just got this one back from James Wiles and had to share. When I saw this one, I had to buy it. I'm not one to just pick up random RPMs (Repunched Mint Marks), especially in the War Nickel Series. There are so many RPMs for each date and Mint Mark. There is no way I'm jumping in that black hole! However, this one just had that little extra wow factor, as something different appears to be going on. I looked at Variety Vista for attribution, but was not satisfied the match was RPM-069, due to the pronounced shelf-like appearance inside the P.

I've never thought much about RPMs other than the die folks punched the Mint Mark a couple or a few times that do not exactly match up. This one appears to have two different Mint Mark punches that were used? The underlying P seems much fatter or thicker than the thinner P on top. Or was a little Mint Mark re-engraving going on to fix something on the initial Mint Mark?

James Wiles pronounced this to be RPM-069 (what did I tell you about the number of RPMs!). He will be adding pictures of this coin to the website, as he has never seen an RPM example as clear as this one. Can't wait to see the posting!

Happy hunting!


Nice steps to top it off!

Comments

  • HemisphericalHemispherical Posts: 9,370 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Congrats @BigDowgie your going to be in the big picture... well your coins is. :)

  • DIMEMANDIMEMAN Posts: 22,403 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Neat RPM....really different. 69 wow.....I thought the 46-D Dime with 33 was a lot!

  • georgiacop50georgiacop50 Posts: 2,909 ✭✭✭✭

    Bizarre

  • rickoricko Posts: 98,724 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Congratulations on your find.... Nice pictures too....Cheers, RickO

  • BigDowgieBigDowgie Posts: 1,749 ✭✭✭✭
    edited April 17, 2019 3:31PM

    I followed up with Mr. Wiles on my observation I noted above.

    I wrote:
    Curious about something. I have a question/observation on the 1943-P/P RPM-069 you just looked at. The more I look at the P/P, it seems more is going on than just a re-punch mint mark? This was created either by punching 2 different mint marks over each other (as a normal RPM) or there has been some re-engraving over the initial P to fix some defect in the punch? I'm leaning more toward re-engraving due to the overlap of the vertical line at the top of the P and the odd (or imperfect) shape of the lines of the top P. Surely the mint did not have a P Punch that was that mis-shaped?

    Mr. Wiles replied:
    I haven't had time to study it. There is no evidence for more than 1 P punch. It is probably multi punched. There would be no reason for re-engraving. A mishap with the punching, was resolved by repunching. It certainly is a unique variety.

    Curious what your opinions/observations might be?

    Thanks

  • BigDowgieBigDowgie Posts: 1,749 ✭✭✭✭

    I guess this got pushed down the list too far? Might there be some opinions? I question Mr. Wiles' reply.

  • HemisphericalHemispherical Posts: 9,370 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Perhaps he does need more time to study? Must have quite a workload.

  • BigDowgieBigDowgie Posts: 1,749 ✭✭✭✭

    @Hemispherical said:
    Perhaps he does need more time to study? Must have quite a workload.

    Yes, I'm sure he does! I'll give him a little slack....for now.

  • StrikeOutXXXStrikeOutXXX Posts: 3,350 ✭✭✭✭✭

    It's certainly different looking. The stem only shows a little secondary punch to the right, with perhaps a slight notch/rotation in the lower left. The loop shows secondary evidence to both the right and left of the inside loop, as well as to the right of the outer loop. (Can't tell if there are artifacts to the left of the stem due to the slight shadow)

    I think the 1st punch was a few degrees clockwise of the second, which would explain the stem, and the extra impression to both the inside of loop on the left, and outside of the loop on the right.

    What doesn't make sense at first glance is the extra artifact on the inside left of the right part of the loop. The prominent MM punch is quite deeper than the first, perhaps there was some shifting of medal going on inside the loop. While I haven't studied too many war nickle RPMs, the few which have crossed my path I don't remember quite as large of an offset/stepping going on between the punches (although that may be the picture playing tricks on me).

    2 other possibilities that briefly crossed my mind was there was actually 3 punches - with both an east & west, or the deeper/primary MM was actually done 1st, and the stem/loop artifacts were from a weakly struck 2nd punch that didn't go as deep and was offset so that the only left marks on the die where the 1st punch hadn't hit.

    Hmmm, just looked up -069 and it is a P/P/P - so that would explain how the artifacts go in both directions. Tricky coin to stare at though - thanks for sharing.

    ------------------------------------------------------------

    "You Suck Award" - February, 2015

    Discoverer of 1919 Mercury Dime DDO - FS-101

Leave a Comment

BoldItalicStrikethroughOrdered listUnordered list
Emoji
Image
Align leftAlign centerAlign rightToggle HTML viewToggle full pageToggle lights
Drop image/file