How to identify US-Phil 1908 inverted S Allen-8.04c; photo examples given.

mharris

I was working out-of-town today and stopped into a local coin shop. Looked through the US-Philippines box and found a stunning 1908-S 10 centavo (will provide pictures tomorrow). I bought it and some other assorted coins and was back on the road. Looking at pcgscoinfacts.com later, PCGS distinguishes between the regular S (Allen-8.04) and inverted S (Allen-8.04c). Question is, how do I distinguish between the two? The rest of this post is an overlay analysis of the five 1908 S 10c images on coinfacts (all located here: 1908-S 10c). At this link, there are TruView images of three 1908-S with no variety attribution and two with the Inverted 's' attribution.

Bottom line is that of these five images, there is no consistency in determining which is which is which. There are three different mint mark positions; the left most position is present in two non-inverted and one inverted images. The middle mint mark position is on a non-inverted image; and the right most position is present on one of the inverted attributions. It is the right hand mint mark location that is also on the example I purchased today. The best way I saw to distinguish between the three is the location of the 's' relative to the "dot" directly above it. The images that follow are overlain and scaled to match (within a small error):

The location of the mint mark on cert 80615809, 11512653, and inverted 's' attributed 21491155 overlay in the same exact location. Below is a composite of all three. This is two non-attributed and one attributed. This is the left-most mint mark location where the vertical red line from the dot cuts the upper serif and lies against the right-hand side of the lower loop of the 's'.

The middle mint mark location is present on a non-attributed example cert# 81798266. Here, the vertical red line is in a similar position as the above example, but cuts a little further into the serif and loop. This mint mark seems to be more south and a little more east compared to the above example.

The right most mint mark location is present on the inverted 's' attributed cert# 10452156. This location is far to the right of the other and the vertical red line cuts through both the upper and lower loops of the 's'. This is the only example where the design of the mint mark appears different to me. I would assume the the inverted 's' would have a different design as the others. Again, this example matches the coin I bought today.

comparing the left most (two non-attributed, and one attributed examples) and middle (non-attributed example) placements:

comparing the left most (two non-attributed, and one attributed examples) and right most (attributed example) placements:

Finally, a image of the location (boxes) of the three locations. The green is attributed example (10452156) and the green is the three non-attributed and one attributed examples (21491155)

I do understand that a variety like this can easily end up unattributed if that service was not paid for. I can also easily understand that an arguably little known variety like this could be misidentified by PCGS. I just want to know if my BU beauty is an inverted 's' or not. Thanks for looking!

BuffaloIronTail

You have it. Your excellent diagnosis and pictures convinced me.

By the way, that S mintmark looks to be the same one from the 1909-S V.D.B.

Pete

RogerB

A suggestion - do not use denticles as part of a location or position reference. All locations should be relative to fixed points on the central design element. This provides a stable point of reference.

derryb

aren't the denticles part of the same die and are fixed in the same position as all coins struck from that die?

RogerB

@derryb said:
aren't the denticles part of the same die and are fixed in the same position as all coins struck from that die?

Everything on an individual die is fixed, but when trying to compare things such as mintmark position from one die to another, you must use a set of points that are identical on all dies - that means the central design. [Sometimes, we want to use the date as a mintmark position reference, such as on SD double eagles.]

The central design - portrait, eagle or wreath - is the only reliable fixed reference. Thus, if you want accurate measurements or location descriptions of mintmarks, digits, or other features, they must directly relate to at least two points within the central element.

mharris

@RogerB said:
A suggestion - do not use denticles as part of a location or position reference. All locations should be relative to fixed points on the central design element. This provides a stable point of reference.

Thanks for the great tip! Here I used the date, dot, shield, and "U"; no denticles. I know the date could be problematic, but as all varieties exhibit the same recut "9", I assumed it was safe to used that feature. At least on these examples, all overlays were unproblematic.

RogerB

It's better to use only points from the central design -- no dots, date, denticles, and so forth. The central design element is the only absolute and reliably stable part of a coin. On some coin series, the date and other elements float from year-to-year and even within the year. That happens through at least 1933 for gold and maybe much further for silver.

Doing this will bring you as close as possible to objective data and measurements.