Martha Washington patterns
The following is from the Charlotte Voice on Jan 25, 2014:
Comments
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I'd love to start a Martha Washington set.
I'll start by digging through my wife's change jar like THIS guy did.How I pay the bills:
https://imdb.com/name/nm1835107/1 -
I had a Waffled example in my hand at the
ANA in Chicago in August, but the owner
turned down my offer.
He thought it was rare, and worth over a
thousand dollars......
I thought it was cool, but knew that there
could easily be hundreds more of them
out there at some point.
My offer would have set a record price
for any Waffled coin, by far!Retired Collector & Dealer in Major Mint Error Coins & Currency since the 1960's.Co-Author of Whitman's "100 Greatest U.S. Mint Error Coins", and the Error Coin Encyclopedia, Vols., III & IV. Retired Authenticator for Major Mint Errors for PCGS. A 50+ Year PNG Member.A full-time numismatist since 1972, retired in 2022.1 -
No thanks.0
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Here's another one from 2012 that looks like VDB could have designed it:
Is USPatterns.com being kept up to date? The last pattern on the site is the 2000W gold Sac - 1880 to date page.0 -
Originally posted by: FredWeinberg
I had a Waffled example in my hand at the
ANA in Chicago in August, but the owner
turned down my offer.
He thought it was rare, and worth over a
thousand dollars......
I thought it was cool, but knew that there
could easily be hundreds more of them
out there at some point.
My offer would have set a record price
for any Waffled coin, by far!
I bet some Aunt Jemima Syrup would have sweetened the deal
Probably thought it was worth 4 figures as there's another out there in a ANACS slab being offered for that amount.To Err Is Human.... To Collect Err's Is Just Too Much Darn Tootin Fun!0 -
Originally posted by: FredWeinberg
I had a Waffled example in my hand at the
ANA in Chicago in August, but the owner
turned down my offer.
He thought it was rare, and worth over a
thousand dollars......
I thought it was cool, but knew that there
could easily be hundreds more of them
out there at some point.
My offer would have set a record price
for any Waffled coin, by far!
It may be worth over a $1000 if he can sell it to a collector before any more are found.0 -
Here's a waffled Martha Washington quarter offered for $2k:
Another two were unsold on Heritage in 2014 CSNS.0 -
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."Professional Numismatist, Retired. 55 year member ANA. Former ANA Senior Authenticator. Winner of four ANA Heath Literary Awards; three Wayte and Olga Raymond Literary Awards; Numismatist of the Year Award 2009, and ANA Lifetime Achievement Award 2020. Winner of the PNG's 2026 Robert Friedberg Award for "The Enigmatic Lincoln Cents of 1922," Available now from Whitman or Amazon.0 -
Originally posted by: CaptHenway
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."
Or Accordioned
To Err Is Human.... To Collect Err's Is Just Too Much Darn Tootin Fun!1 -
I would love to find one of these in circulation... what a thrill....not sure how they got
out there - well, beyond the obvious - but strange the feds are not chasing them - or do
they only chase gold and silver? Sounds like discrimination to me...
Cheers, RickO 0 -
At one time the Martha Washington designs were available to private firms either doing work for the Mint or testing materials.
Not sure of the protocol involved, but the Mint would ship a set of dies to the outside manufacturer, and they would strike
a number of pieces. I don't think that there was a requirement about the resulting tokens, so in some cases there could be
hundreds or thousands extent.
Now that Dan Carr is around, there might not be the need for these anymore, as Dan can whip up a set of dies pretty quickly.0 -
Originally posted by: CaptHenway
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."
The term waffled comes from the other side such as this image. It's cool that you can see the copper breaking out of the bend.0 -
Originally posted by: ZoinsOriginally posted by: CaptHenway
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."
The term waffled comes from the other side such as this image. It's cool that you can see the copper breaking out of the bend.
Looks more like it went through a paper shredder then waffle iron
To Err Is Human.... To Collect Err's Is Just Too Much Darn Tootin Fun!0 -
Originally posted by: BroadstruckOriginally posted by: ZoinsOriginally posted by: CaptHenway
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."
The term waffled comes from the other side such as this image. It's cool that you can see the copper breaking out of the bend.
Looks more like it went through a paper shredder then waffle iron
My shredder works a bit better than just making impressions
I can imagine some Aunt Jemima on that
0 -
Originally posted by: Hydrant
Why would anyboby pay anything for a smashed-up coin? Probably a stupid question but I'm a newbie and so I obviously don't know what's really valuable.
The US Mint is probably wondering the same question. Of course, the answer is that it's smashed-up by the right people
Waffle cancelled coins are slabbed by all 4 major TPGs as well.0 -
When the Mint was testing a Grabener press before full-scale
production on the five-ounce, three-inch-diameter America the
Beautiful silver coins, it used dies with a Martha Washington
portrait and nonsense legends. All of the test coins were reportedly
recycled. I suggested to the Mint that at least two of them
should be sent to the Smithsonian for the National Numismatic
Collection.
1 -
Originally posted by: Dentuck
When the Mint was testing a Grabener press before full-scale
production on the five-ounce, three-inch-diameter America the
Beautiful silver coins, it used dies with a Martha Washington
portrait and nonsense legends. All of the test coins were reportedly
recycled. I suggested to the Mint that at least two of them
should be sent to the Smithsonian for the National Numismatic
Collection.
That's very cool and good to know.
When you say recycled, were they waffled? 0 -
More info here including photos of the Martha Washington Shield Cent pattern.
- Text and photos on CoinUpdate.com
- US Mint Alternative Metals Study Phase II Technical Report
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I check the 'take a cent/leave a cent' bin for things like this.... no luck so far.. Cheers, RickO0
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Originally posted by: ZoinsOriginally posted by: BroadstruckOriginally posted by: ZoinsOriginally posted by: CaptHenway
Silly question, but why are these called "waffled?" Who coined the term, so to speak?
Waffles have a grid pattern. To me this is "corrugated."
The term waffled comes from the other side such as this image. It's cool that you can see the copper breaking out of the bend.
Looks more like it went through a paper shredder then waffle iron
My shredder works a bit better than just making impressions
I can imagine some Aunt Jemima on that
Or some A-1 cause it looks more Grilled than waffled
Steve
Promote the Hobby0 -
Here is a rare Martha Washington Dime Pattern Judd-2101. It was used to check the Clad composition in 1965 (or late 1964). These were originally believed to be only remaining in Lucite blocks at the Smithsonian. In fact the lucite blocks containing the Martha Washington patterns coins were shown at the signing of the Coinage Act on July 23, 1965. President Lyndon B. Johnson complained about the Lucite block encasement during his remarks that day:
"My Secretary of the Treasury, Joe Fowler, is a little stingy about making samples, but I have some here. Joe made sure that I wouldn't put them in my pocket by sending them over here in plastic."
A few have been found since; this dime in my collection:
Here is one of the Lucite Blocks LBJ references; now in the Smithsonian:
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A Martha Washington half dollar die is being offered for $50k now.
3 -
@FredWeinberg said:
I had a Waffled example in my hand at the
ANA in Chicago in August, but the owner
turned down my offer.He thought it was rare, and worth over a
thousand dollars......I thought it was cool, but knew that there
could easily be hundreds more of them
out there at some point.My offer would have set a record price
for any Waffled coin, by far!Have you run across any others?
I can actually see this worth over a thousand dollars to someone if it was the only one known. The owner would just need to wait till he ran across that person. The waffled Martha Washington quarter above is being sold for $2,000 and there are many non-waffled specimens. If there is only one waffled or non-waffled specimen of a 5 cent piece, someone may value it over $1,000.
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The 5C coin I saw at the Chicago ANA back in 2015,
and didn't buy, showed up at the ANA last week.It was purchased by Jon Sullivan - so far, it's the
only one out there. In my post back in '15, I had
mentioned that I wasn't sure there couldn't be
hundreds of them (or more)......but no other
pieces, waffled or not, have shown up.There is a Coin World article on it already, I believe.
Retired Collector & Dealer in Major Mint Error Coins & Currency since the 1960's.Co-Author of Whitman's "100 Greatest U.S. Mint Error Coins", and the Error Coin Encyclopedia, Vols., III & IV. Retired Authenticator for Major Mint Errors for PCGS. A 50+ Year PNG Member.A full-time numismatist since 1972, retired in 2022.0 -
@FredWeinberg said:
The 5C coin I saw at the Chicago ANA back in 2015,
and didn't buy, showed up at the ANA last week.It was purchased by Jon Sullivan - so far, it's the
only one out there. In my post back in '15, I had
mentioned that I wasn't sure there couldn't be
hundreds of them (or more)......but no other
pieces, waffled or not, have shown up.There is a Coin World article on it already, I believe.
Good info. It's a tough call. It's one of those pieces where you could take a bath or not get another opportunity.
Here's the Coin World article and photos. It was discovered by a Pennsylvania man that does bag searches.
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I grabbed one as I thought they could be very rare. I am very glad that a flood of others did not show up
1 -
This excerpt from experimental "nonsense coin" destruction lists might be of interest. All these are of the Martha Washington design.
3 -
@Zoins said:
Is USPatterns.com being kept up to date? The last pattern on the site is the 2000W gold Sac - 1880 to date page.
It’s updated regularly.
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.1 -
Roger, does destruction mean "waffled canceled"
Those are extremely low numbers.
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I see the news and article references, but I was referring to the concordance.
The 2000W entry is in the Concordance and that still seems to be the latest entry there.
http://uspatterns.com/pat18todat.html
A more specific question is whether the following Martha Washington cents and nickels should be included in the Concordance?
The 2000W dollar listed is only in public government hands and now there is a cancelled Martha Washington nickel in private hands.
http://news.coinupdate.com/us-mint-reports-findings-of-alternative-coin-materials-research-1765/
1 -
@Zoins said:
A more specific question is whether the following Martha Washington cents and nickels should be included in the Concordance?
I’ll discuss with Saul.
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.1 -
@ErrorsOnCoins said:
Roger, does destruction mean "waffled canceled"Those are extremely low numbers.
No. This pre-dates waffling by about 30 years. The coins were usually rolled out, then melted and cast into bars for re-use or sale to industry.
2 -
Thank you, now I see the date on the bottom of the document. Duh!
I thank you for bringing this forum so many valuable documents to the numismatic community!
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You're welcome. Sometimes the documents tell us things we don't really want to accept, and sometimes they open new doors.
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According to Saul:
"I have the following items noted but I haven’t given them Judd numbers yet as I do not if we have all of the alloys listed and/or enough information on how to identify them. That would be helpful prior to setting them up."
http://uspatterns.stores.yahoo.net/2012testpieces2.html
http://uspatterns.stores.yahoo.net/2012testpieces1.html
http://uspatterns.stores.yahoo.net/2012testpieces.html
And according to me, it's only a matter of time and research before the coins are listed in the concordance. So don't blame us, blame Roger! (I mean, seriously, who else is going to do the research?)
Andy Lustig
Doggedly collecting coins of the Central American Republic.
Visit the Society of US Pattern Collectors at USPatterns.com.2 -
Thanks for the confidence, Andy, but I avoid these things whenever possible. The absence of consistent, reliable data from the Mint Bureau makes it nearly impossible to approach "completeness" for any of these. The destruction lists for the 1960s are useful since they correlate with Inco and Gould (1970s) private pattern pieces. But other pieces are isolated and have limited context. I feel the Mint Historian's Office should be documenting all this experimentation, but evidently the Mint Bureau does not.
1 -
@Zoins said:
A Martha Washington half dollar die is being offered for $50k now.It is still on eBay, but now in a NGC box/slab/cube/whatever they call then
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Here's another image I ran across on Google cache, which is no longer online:
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Here's a good thread on these:
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I purchased this example at the ANA, and later sold it. Great coin, and the only one I've seen. It appears in person like a copper, nickel sized coin, but of course has the Martha design on it. Really neat piece, and it went to a collector. With the same coin came a Martha pattern quarter. One of the neatest coins to walk up to my table!
Interesting update--another Martha Washington piece came out of the same group. I didn't notice it at first, but upon closer examination noticed one of the coins is a quarter size Martha Washington "nonsense". Loo> @Zoins said:
@FredWeinberg said:
The 5C coin I saw at the Chicago ANA back in 2015,
and didn't buy, showed up at the ANA last week.It was purchased by Jon Sullivan - so far, it's the
only one out there. In my post back in '15, I had
mentioned that I wasn't sure there couldn't be
hundreds of them (or more)......but no other
pieces, waffled or not, have shown up.There is a Coin World article on it already, I believe.
Good info. It's a tough call. It's one of those pieces where you could take a bath or not get another opportunity.
Here's the Coin World article and photos. It was discovered by a Pennsylvania man that does bag searches.
www.sullivannumismatics.com Dealer in Mint Error Coins since 2003.2 -
@SullivanNumismatics said:
I purchased this example at the ANA, and later sold it. Great coin, and the only one I've seen. It appears in person like a copper, nickel sized coin, but of course has the Martha design on it. Really neat piece, and it went to a collector. With the same coin came a Martha pattern quarter. One of the neatest coins to walk up to my table!Interesting update--another Martha Washington piece came out of the same group. I didn't notice it at first, but upon closer examination noticed one of the coins is a quarter size Martha Washington "nonsense". Loo
@Zoins said:
@FredWeinberg said:
The 5C coin I saw at the Chicago ANA back in 2015,
and didn't buy, showed up at the ANA last week.It was purchased by Jon Sullivan - so far, it's the
only one out there. In my post back in '15, I had
mentioned that I wasn't sure there couldn't be
hundreds of them (or more)......but no other
pieces, waffled or not, have shown up.There is a Coin World article on it already, I believe.
Good info. It's a tough call. It's one of those pieces where you could take a bath or not get another opportunity.
Here's the Coin World article and photos. It was discovered by a Pennsylvania man that does bag searches.
Very cool Jon! It's great to have more history on this coin!
1 -
It was a fun coin to handle. A nickel-sized, copper (in appearance) Martha experimental piece is unexpected.
www.sullivannumismatics.com Dealer in Mint Error Coins since 2003.1 -
@SullivanNumismatics said:
It was a fun coin to handle. A nickel-sized, copper (in appearance) Martha experimental piece is unexpected.Do you know the composition?
I found the following 2018 article on this pattern coin, but no composition was given:
Paul Gilkes said:
A normal Jefferson 5-cent coin is composed of 75 percent copper and 25 percent nickel, measures 21.2 millimeters in diameter and weighs 5 grams. The test piece, copper in color, weighs 4 grams. It was originally struck with Mount Vernon and Martha Washington dies, referred to as nonsense dies, used in alloy-testing strikes.Copper-plated zinc is one of the alloys tested at the Philadelphia Mint under provisions of the Coin Modernization, Oversight and Continuity Act of 2010, Public Law 11-302. The Mint is still conducting research and development into finding a suitable alloy replacement to bring the production costs of the 5-cent coin below face value. The Mint is also looking for alloy replacements for the copper-nickel clad dime and the quarter dollar.
Do you think it's Judd-2221, which is referenced in an earlier 2014 article also by Pail Gilkes.
USPatterns.com wrote:
J2221 - Copper-Plated Zinc (Jarden Zinc Products) According to a February 10, 2014 article by Paul Gilkes in Coin World, the Mint has also experimented with using current copper-plated zinc planchets similar to that used on the current Lincoln cent as imaged below.Ref: https://uspatterns.stores.yahoo.net/2012testpieces1.html
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@davewesen said:
@Zoins said:
A Martha Washington half dollar die is being offered for $50k now.It is still on eBay, but now in a NGC box/slab/cube/whatever they call then
While the eBay link isn't active any more, the archive link from Mike @Byers is still up.
https://mikebyers.com/martha-washington-obverse-die.html
Here's the NGC insert photo:
This was also a Mint Error News cover piece!
1 -
Here's a great coin with a prominent die clash.
How common are coins with this, or other die clashes?
Is the clash tracked with a Judd variety number?
2 -
The story and history of the Martha Washington test pieces and dies, are certainly one of the most interesting in numismatics.
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.1 -
Here is the unique Judd # 2225 cancelled Martha Washington Test Piece. After 12 years it is still unique. None are known in private hands without the cancelation either! NGC encapsulated this in a regular holder.
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.1 -
@Zoins, 5c size struck on a copper plated zinc planchet, with a weight of 4.06 grams.
@Zoins said:
@SullivanNumismatics said:
I purchased this example at the ANA, and later sold it. Great coin, and the only one I've seen. It appears in person like a copper, nickel sized coin, but of course has the Martha design on it. Really neat piece, and it went to a collector. With the same coin came a Martha pattern quarter. One of the neatest coins to walk up to my table!Interesting update--another Martha Washington piece came out of the same group. I didn't notice it at first, but upon closer examination noticed one of the coins is a quarter size Martha Washington "nonsense". Loo
@Zoins said:
@FredWeinberg said:
The 5C coin I saw at the Chicago ANA back in 2015,
and didn't buy, showed up at the ANA last week.It was purchased by Jon Sullivan - so far, it's the
only one out there. In my post back in '15, I had
mentioned that I wasn't sure there couldn't be
hundreds of them (or more)......but no other
pieces, waffled or not, have shown up.There is a Coin World article on it already, I believe.
Good info. It's a tough call. It's one of those pieces where you could take a bath or not get another opportunity.
Here's the Coin World article and photos. It was discovered by a Pennsylvania man that does bag searches.
Very cool Jon! It's great to have more history on this coin!
www.sullivannumismatics.com Dealer in Mint Error Coins since 2003.1 -
Thanks for posting the Half Dollar Size Martha Washington Obverse Test Die.
For those who aren’t aware, here is the only known Cent size Martha Washington Reverse Die:
mikebyers.com Dealer in Major Mint Errors, Die Trials & Patterns - Author of NLG Best World Coin Book World's Greatest Mint Errors - Publisher & Editor of minterrornews.com.2 -
What makes something the only known?
I once held a die of the design described in these articles in private hands.
https://coinbooks.org/esylum_v15n37a18.htmlhttps://coinworld.com/news/precious-metals/new-martha-washington-dies-in-use-for-tests.html
I don't think it has a Judd number. I do think I saw a waffled coin with that design.
0
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