Silver dimes with similar distinctive toning

planetsteve

I've always enjoyed toners, and I have a couple of pairs of matching coins I wanted to share. Toning has many different appearances, and I bet it's nifty to collect this way. I've seen PDS sets; why not make a trio of coins with similar appearance? Here's the 41 and 41-S; all I need now is the 41-D.

In this case, both coins are 1944-S. I was amazed to find a second coin and happy to have a duplicate of sorts. I wonder how these dimes were stored. This reminds me of cats-eye toning, which I understand is a story of cardboard holders. (Seems to me that toning is seen mostly on 45-S dimes, which if true might be interesting.)

jmski52

That 44-S is magnificent.

So is that 44-S.

Pizzaman

Very nice. Those '44s are to kill for, well done.

gumby1234

I have a nice 55 S Roosie toner and @robec has its twin.

planetsteve

@gumby1234 said:
I have a nice 55 S Roosie toner and @robec has its twin.

Would love to see either one. I have that issue in a nice toner myself.

gumby1234

planetsteve

I imagine the 55-S spent time in a album... or a mint set?

TomB

The 1941 and 1941-S Mercs remind me of coins that had been in old fatty NGC holders for years and then crossed to PCGS.

robec

@gumby1234 said:

robec

I love this style of rim toning.

keyman64

I have encountered a lot of this in Mercury Dimes, Roosevelt Dimes and have seen CBHs that are also similar. It frequently just comes down to the popular storage methods for each era/denomination etc.

Nice Dimes everyone.

gumby1234

@keyman64 sometimes I think certain year or mm coins tend to tone a certain way also.

planetsteve

@TomB said:
The 1941 and 1941-S Mercs remind me of coins that had been in old fatty NGC holders for years and then crossed to PCGS.

Thanks very much for this. Up until recently I would not have thought that a plastic holder would tone a coin (maybe the label somehow, but plastics?). A dealer pointed out to me that the blue rim toning -- like what @robec posted -- is viewed as an NGC holder effect as well.

What I especially like about the 1941 is how the toning happened to complement Liberty's face. I love this coin. It's whimsical. Now, the 1941-S is nice, and it's got a different type of luster (another way to collect?), but I don't think the toning lands as attractively. As it happens, I cracked the 41-S out of a 67 prong holder from ATS, and our hosts graded it 66.

planetsteve

My 55-S is different. Cardboard album, maybe?

planetsteve

@gumby1234 said:
@keyman64 sometimes I think certain year or mm coins tend to tone a certain way also.

I did recently pick up my first cats-eye toning Merc. It's a 45-S in an NGC 66 Star holder. I think that the majority of coins that show this toning pattern are 1945-S. It's remarkable how specific it seems. It's like maybe banks out west had a certain kind of dime-saving folder in 1945. It's a really interesting mystery to me.

gumby1234

@planetsteve Old PCI green label slabs were notorious for toning the coins. Label states 100 percent white.

planetsteve

@gumby1234 now there's a picture of the word "irony." Is the consensus that the label is doing it... or is it something else about the holder?

gumby1234

@planetsteve The thought is it was the label. I have 2 of the 99 ASE in PCI and they are so close to identical that I use the cert number to differentiate.

Pizzaman

gumby1234

@Pizzaman nice AU dime. Looks like the toning may be terminal or close to it. Nice coin for an album thou.

joeykoins

Here are 2 examples
1964 ms 64

Here's a Peculiar Toner
1962 pf. 66

Pizzaman

@gumby1234 said:
@Pizzaman nice AU dime. Looks like the toning may be terminal or close to it. Nice coin for an album thou.

Thank you, @gumby1234. These pictures are maybe some twelve or fifteen years old. They were taken with a thing called camera, lol. Anyway, I absolutely agree with you, but it's holding steady. I gave it a quick acetone dunk back then and I'm pleased it's in a stable environment. I wish the greens on the reverse came across better. FWIW, it's really prettier than it looks in these pictures.

robec

@planetsteve said:

Thanks very much for this. Up until recently I would not have thought that a plastic holder would tone a coin (maybe the label somehow, but plastics?). A dealer pointed out to me that the blue rim toning -- like what @robec posted -- is viewed as an NGC holder effect as well.

The 1940-S and 1944-S were already in PCGS plastic when I acquired them.

The 1918 and 1942-S were both cracked from old ANACS holders.
The 1945-S was in an NGC holder. I cracked out and sent to PCGS 10 years ago. My thoughts are that it and the 1940-S and 1944-S were in old ANACS slabs first.

robec

A couple more pair with similar toning