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State Quarter Coin & Defaced Die Set
PocketArt
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In pursuit of looking for the next bronze plaque of a rare numismatic item portraying unbelievable historical significance on Ebay, I came across these listings for State Quarters with a defaced die issued by the U.S. mint. I never knew the mint issued these State Quarters with used, defaced dies...I knew of the spoons; but, this is pretty cool. A couple questions: Did the US mint issue any other oddities beside the spoons, and State coins with defaced dies? Does anyone have a complete set of these quarters with dies? Do any of you think they ever will be worth a premium? They are interesting.........
Hat tip to Julian Coins for listing:
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That's nice! I wonder how much they sold for originally.
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Yes- or, even how many produced by mint each year for date, and for "P," "D" ?
Some defaced dies for Olympic commemorative coins could be purchased as well in the past. For a while it looked like coin and defaced die sets would be a thing.
I have one from 1999...the Pennsylvania D mint. I bought it directly from the mint, can't remember what I paid. The first year it came in foam pack in a priority mail box...I have seen later ones come in nice presentation boxes. I honestly have no idea of value, but it is a really cool piece!
Philip Diehl, the Mint Director in the 90's, was really into marketing coin ephemera. Check out some of the stuff sold with modern commems at: https://www.usmint.gov/about_the_mint/index3a17.html?action=historical-commemorative-coin-sales
In 1996, the Mint sold cancelled, but not completely defaced dies for the commemorative issues of the time.
In 1998, they sold completely defaced, cent, nickel, dime, and quarter dies. I have record that the 1998 cent dies sold for $29.95 with a limit of 4,445 sold. The nickels sold for $39.95 with a limit of 1,300 sold. The dimes sold for $34.95 with a limit of 2,920 sold. The quarters sold for $34.95 with a limit of 2,220 sold.
In 1999, they began selling the 50 State Quarters coin and die sets, which were also completely defaced. They sold for $34.95 originally, and I believe this was the price when the program ended in 2008.
In 2004 and 2005, they issued coin die sets for the four varieties of nickels issued in those years. They were also completely defaces. These sets sold for $39.95.
The non-Olympic coin & die sets are relatively unpopular, because they have no design left. The 50 state quarter coin & die sets can be picked up anywhere from $10 - $25 in most cases today. I should also note, that prior to 1996, there were multiple mass releases of coin dies. One such release (of 1992 and 1993 dies I believe) was to our very own Fred Weinberg.
The Mint used to sell many different trinkets: key chains, key rings, tie tacks, lapel pins, pocket watches, pendants, money clips, cuff links, wrist watches, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, rings, holiday ornaments, pocket knives, pen sets, brooches, fobs, golf divots, paperweights, and bookmarks. The Mint has now moved far away from this type of marketing.
Thanks GoldenEgg for the informative post...
You mean to tell me that In all that marketing haste they couldn't even produce a Pez dispenser? No wonder so few YN are in the ranks....
Wow... I knew the mint sold some extraneous items, but never knew all those were offered. They were almost a novelty shop....Cheers, RickO
The 1995/1996 Olympic commemorative coins weren't selling well so the US Mint decided to sell the dies used to make these coins to increase interest in these coins. The dies show almost all the original design since they were cancelled with a thin X machined across the face of the die. They included a certificate of authenticity with each die that was unique to that specific die and listed the serial number of the die, the dates it was used, the number of coins struck from that specific die, and the reason that die had to be retired from service. These dies sold out very quickly and are quite popular with coin collectors. Only the dollar and five dollar dies were cancelled and sold. For some reason the mint didn't sell cancelled half dollar dies. They are fairly expensive since not that many were available for sale but they can occasional be found on eBay. Price depends on the specific design and denomination. Some of the cancelled five dollar dies are quite rare and expensive.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
"Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value---zero."----Voltaire
"Everything you say should be true, but not everything true should be said."----Voltaire
The trouble with these State Quarter die sets is that the face of the die is totally blanked. There is nothing to see but a flat surface which makes these things less than interesting for me. That is probably why this eBay sells has a quarter set on the face of the die. Otherwise he would have nothing to show.
As others have said there are canceled dies from the 1996 Atlanta Olympics sets which show quite a bit of detail. There are also defaced dies that were used to make the 1968-S Proof coins. Both of these are far more interesting that the State Quarter dies.
Die face
Mirror image
Coin
I have had various US Mint dies. Was usually not really impressed. One was completely ground flat and one was torched into a blob. I have not had any 1968-S proof dies - I heard some were used to make interesting 'errors'. I did have an Olympic proof, and they are cool and rare, so usually in the $700-$1000 range.
GoldenEgg pretty much nailed it as far as info.
The Mint sold 2,833 Cancelled ("X'd") Olympic Coin Dies,
both $1 and $5, a total of 22 different designs. Highest
issue was 632 Silver Dollar Reverse Dies (although there is
some disagreement that that number may be too high)
and a low of 8 dies sold of the 1995-W $5 Gold Torch Runner.
The Defaced Dies I bought from the Denver Mint were not
sold as 'Dies' - they were sold as scrap metal. I bought a
large group in 1996 that had approx. 20,000 dies, from cents
thru Commemorative Dollars, all from the Denver Mint, and
all dated 1993 or 1994 (on the base of the die, not on the field).
As far as the State Quarter and Cent thru Dime dies being sold,
I've always bought them from dealers, but I stopped selling them
on my website, and on Ebay, around 2009, when I found out
from Beth Deisher (then of Coin World) that the Chinese were
using these Defaced US coin dies to make THEIR counterfeit dies
for those denominations.
I'm not sure now, but I don't think they need to use our dies,
now about 7-8 years later. They can make their own.
And, as an aside, just last month (Dec.) I had to move four
55-Gallon Steel Drums filled with the balance of my Denver
Mint Dies (approx. 8,000+, from guessing) from the front
inside of my garage to the back of the garage, so that a new
Garage Door could be installed. It took two full weekend days
to move them about 10-12 feet back in the garage, and then
move them back again, after the new door was installed.
That was fun.........not
Sort of a re-post but it's fun - here's one of the proof Torch Runner die (obverse) with the matching reverse.
As Fred noted, there was only eight dies were released by the mint. There were 39 1995 $5 proof reverse dies released in the sale.
The dies are awesome.
Does anyone remember a few years back, someone had bought up a bunch of the $1 dies and they were going to stamp some coins in silver. I remember seeing an ad for it and then nothing. I'm assuming Uncle Sam put a stop to their plans.
The US Olympic Committee shut them down, not Uncle Sam.
coinworld.com/news/us-coins/2013/12/usoc-private-minter-reach-settlement-on-medal.html
But, this just showed up recently at $145:
https://qualitysilverbullion.com/product/canceled-us-mint-die-medals-set/
Dang, that is super cool! Too pricey at $145 for me to buy one.
I doubt that the story of the Chinese re-engraving cancelled US Mint dies is true.
A typical tool steel, in the as-forged un-hardened state, will be around 20 on the hardness scale. This is soft enough to machine and engrave fairly easily. After hardening, the tool will typically be 60 hardness, which is strong and stiff enough for striking. In 2007 I acquired from Fred Weinberg a couple sets of the scrap defaced dies (all denominations from cent to large dollar). I attempted to re-use them. But after annealing them, I could only get them down to about 35 hardness, not 20. I was still able to do some engraving on them, however. But upon heat-treating (hardening) them again, I could only get them up to about 45 to 50 hardness. That was insufficient and the dies "mushroomed" when striking with any significant force.
I suspect that what the Chinese might have actually done is to re-forge (melt) the die steel into new die blanks. This would yield "fresh" tool steel that could be engraved and then would take the proper hardening. So the US Mint cancelled dies may have just been a convenient way for the Chinese to obtain steel which already had the proper formula for coinage dies.
Here is one of the defaced US Mint dies from Fred that I had attempted to anneal. After annealing, I noticed a few faint details remaining (image of die face mirrored for easier viewing):
Note the die crack deep into the shank, extending from the die face to the "D4" in the serial number. The small divot in the center of the die face is from a hardness test that I performed.
The word "UNITED" is still partially visible, as well as quotation marks ("). I have positively matched this up to the reverse of a 1993-D WW2 commemorative silver dollar. This particular die is of special interest to me because it was used in my Denver Mint surplus coin press (my Grabener press struck all the commemorative coins, mint set coins and medals that were produced at the Denver Mint from about 1986 to about 2001, and as far as I can tell, it was the ONLY press used for those).
Having designed the NY and RI state quarters, a couple years ago I decided that I wanted to get a set of the P and D coin and die sets for each. I found that it was a little bit more difficult than I had thought for New York. And for Rhode Island, it was very difficult. Eventually I found a seller on the internet who had some, so I bought several of each. I had always wondered if the die in these sets really did strike the coin that came with it. When I looked at one of the NY dies, it was clear that it was a NY die, due to some detail remaining (Liberty's hand & torch, "N", and a couple stars):
For my 2016 "open house" tokens, I used a 1996 X-cancelled US Mint $5 half eagle reverse die (UNC finish) for one side, paired with my 2016 Clark Gruber half eagle obverse die. These were struck on a wide variety of items. This was an expensive die to purchase and so I was concerned about using it in this manner, but it worked out fine.
Daniel, yes, your comments make sense about the
dies being melted, and then turned into useable
dies again.
Beth didn't go into specifics at the time, but I bet
you're correct......