Question for pre-1878 Carson City die variety experts

lermish

I was in a discussion (read - I was learning from someone with knowledge ) regarding some of the peculiarities of the reverse dies used on 1873-76 CC trade dollars, particularly the wide CC reverse die that was used across the years.

Was there there any Seated or gold coinage of around that vintage that also had some shenanigans/weirdness around unique dies re-used across multiple years? If so, any thoughts or theories around why that might have occurred?

Here is a 74-CC Wide CC I found in the archives courtesy of @kaz

AUandAG

The 1878cc Morgan and 1880cc Morgan share the same reverse. Small CC and parallel tail feathers with concave breast feathers.
bob

CaptHenway

Know that there was nothing against an old die being used across many years until it finally wore out. There was one Proof Quarter reverse die used across 7 or 8 years in the 1870s just because it was still good. The 1877 business strike cents used an old style reverse last used in (I think) 1872. The 1879-S Reverse of 1878 and the above-mentioned 1880-cc Reverse of 1878 Morgan dollars are also good examples. No shenanigans involved, just thrift.

ricko

Dies were expensive, and used (usually) until they could not be used anymore...Cheers, RickO

lermish

@CaptHenway said:
Know that there was nothing against an old die being used across many years until it finally wore out. There was one Proof Quarter reverse die used across 7 or 8 years in the 1870s just because it was still good. The 1877 business strike cents used an old style reverse last used in (I think) 1872. The 1879-S Reverse of 1878 and the above-mentioned 1880-cc Reverse of 1878 Morgan dollars are also good examples. No shenanigans involved, just thrift.

This makes perfect sense, thank you. But were there any where dies were subbed in and out like with the Wide CC Trade dollars? It just seems odd that they would use multiple dies across years, the type 1 & 2, which makes sense for thrift, but then also randomly pop in this third Wide CC die for seemingly very small batches.

Edit - So I guess I'm curious if there were any other "on purpose" small batches for other coins.

cccoins

@lermish said:

@CaptHenway said:
Know that there was nothing against an old die being used across many years until it finally wore out. There was one Proof Quarter reverse die used across 7 or 8 years in the 1870s just because it was still good. The 1877 business strike cents used an old style reverse last used in (I think) 1872. The 1879-S Reverse of 1878 and the above-mentioned 1880-cc Reverse of 1878 Morgan dollars are also good examples. No shenanigans involved, just thrift.

This makes perfect sense, thank you. But were there any where dies were subbed in and out like with the Wide CC Trade dollars? It just seems odd that they would use multiple dies across years, the type 1 & 2, which makes sense for thrift, but then also randomly pop in this third Wide CC die for seemingly very small batches.

Edit - So I guess I'm curious if there were any other "on purpose" small batches for other coins.

I believe that the 1870 to 1873 cc quarters share a common reverse die. Also, the Carson City mint had many years where they would coin and denim for a day or so, and then stop for a while. It wasn’t like they were making 1870 cc quarters on the same press every day. Under this, it would make sense that the same dies would be in rotation over time.

CaptHenway

@lermish said:

@CaptHenway said:
Know that there was nothing against an old die being used across many years until it finally wore out. There was one Proof Quarter reverse die used across 7 or 8 years in the 1870s just because it was still good. The 1877 business strike cents used an old style reverse last used in (I think) 1872. The 1879-S Reverse of 1878 and the above-mentioned 1880-cc Reverse of 1878 Morgan dollars are also good examples. No shenanigans involved, just thrift.

This makes perfect sense, thank you. But were there any where dies were subbed in and out like with the Wide CC Trade dollars? It just seems odd that they would use multiple dies across years, the type 1 & 2, which makes sense for thrift, but then also randomly pop in this third Wide CC die for seemingly very small batches.

Edit - So I guess I'm curious if there were any other "on purpose" small batches for other coins.

They were not variety collectors like us. One was the same as the other to them.