Name this error if you can = **ANSWER IN ORIGINAL POST**
MWallace
Posts: 3,877 ✭✭✭✭✭
Looking for the complete description for this error. Sometime tomorrow (Saturday) evening I will post the answer along with a short story about my purchase of the coin. @CaptHenway is disqualified from answering as he helped me by figuring out the error description.
ANSWER
I meant to post the answer last night but wasn't able to get online. Some GREAT posts here and I loved the discussion. Many eventually figured it out, or were on the right track, but congrats to @jonathanb for being first to give the most complete answer.
I first saw this coin in a dealers stock about 8 months or so ago. I immediately recognized that it wasn't the run-of-the-mill "Partial Brockage", which is how it was labeled. I spent several months trying to figure it out. I collected error coins very heavily in the 1970's, 80's, and 90's. I may have been able to figure it out then. Using the "old age card", my brain was trying to figure it out but was just getting twisted like a pretzel. So I turned to @CaptHenway. He wrote a great response to me that I hope he doesn't mind a redacted version quoted here.
He wrote: "Way damn kewl! If I was writing this up for Collectors Clearinghouse I would probably say:
"Partial obverse brockage struck through off center cent which adhered to the edge of the obverse die, forming a partial cap."
I purchased the coin and contacted ANACS about reholdering it with a "more accurate description" that would fit on the label.
I got it back recently. I agree with @CaptHenway, it was most likely formed from an off-center cap, but I guess it can't be proven, thus the description "Partial Brockage From Off-Center Cent", which still works even if the off-center was stuck to the obverse die.
Comments
Feeder finger strike through.
Partial brockage strike through a previous normal strike coin.
The radius of the strike through is considerably smaller than the radius of any cent or dime so what "normal strike coin" could have possibly caused this strike through error?
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
The two pieces of wire, must be a clue to this mysterious strike thru. Still pondering. 🤔
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I thought the same thing at first glance but then after looking closer, those two lines are curved in the wrong direction for them to have been imprinted by the stems of the wheat ears.
I’m stumped on this one so far.
Does some have a pic of a mint press feeder finger from this era that they can post?
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
It appears to be a first-strike partial brockage by a coin that was struck off center on an elliptical clipped planchet and that had remained adhered to the obverse die.
The incuse lines indicated by red arrows below are indeed the mirror-image impressions of the wheat stems.
I pretty much agree with @IkesT, partial brockage of the reverse design by another error, the obverse is also slightly misaligned.
Something like this?
Disclaimer: I'm not a dealer, trader, grader, investor or professional numismatist. I'm just a hobbyist. (To protect me but mostly you! 🤣 )
I guess we can rule out a feeder finger strike through since it's the wrong shape.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
@IkesT is close but it's not an elliptical clip. This is a first strike brockage from an off-center strike. The off-center strike was of the "tab" type, and this coin was struck through the tab part only.
Note that the alignment is perfect. If you could see through to the back of the coin, that's right where the wheat stalks should be. This sort of exact alignment isn't unusual. The simplest explanation is that the first coin stuck to the obverse die and came back down in the same place. That part is unprovable and doesn't change the description of the error. It makes the sequence easier to understand though.
Since I am excluded from participating I will name the error "Marvin!"
This is a great explanation, the only thing I could add is that it could be a fragment that stuck to the obverse die, though the shape and alignment lead me to think it's an off-center as jonathan suggested.
Sean Reynolds
"Keep in mind that most of what passes as numismatic information is no more than tested opinion at best, and marketing blather at worst. However, I try to choose my words carefully, since I know that you guys are always watching." - Joe O'Connor
A challenge! I’ll try.
A cent or planchet was struck offcenter, ~85% creating a tab. That coin was then fed into the striking chamber again and the struck “tab” overlapped another planchet, wheat stalks down. That planchet (op coin) was then struck, slightly offcenter, receiving an indent and brockage from the previous offcenter strike.
A brockage from an off-center strike is supported not only by the shape and alignment of the brockage, but also its uniform depth and even surface.
The surfaces of a struck fragment tend to have various irregularities in shape and would therefore typically leave an uneven impression in the coin, so I would also rule out a struck through struck fragment error for that reason.
See the post from @jonathanb . The simplest explanation is that the coin that produced the brockage was struck off center and stuck to the obverse die.
Correction
:
Partial brockage strike through a previously-struck off-center coin.
The obverse rim edge looks complete and die slightly misaligned. I have difficult time determining what is indented or raised from pic.
I dont mean to highjack this thread, but I think I may have a very similar error.
It is not off-center like your example, but it has a similar partial brockage showing part of the reverse. I have wondered how this could have happened for quite awhile. Hopefully my coin will bring some new insight.
Please excuse the graffiti and corrosion.
Member of Early American Coppers (EAC), American Numismatic Association (ANA), and Missouri Numismatic Society (MNS). Specializing in early American copper by die variety.
You may be right.
Thats an interesting one. First thought it was a partial brockage but the wheat stems are facing the wrong way. I think the partial brockage from an off-center strike may be it? Knowing Mike it's something really neat.
Young Numismatist/collector
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The wheat stems are not facing the wrong way; they are a mirror-image impression of the design.
But wouldn't they be facing upwards if it was a brockage from a normal struck cent?
Edit: Now I'm just getting confused. Look forward to finding out what it is.
Young Numismatist/collector
75 Positive BST transactions buying and selling with 45 members and counting!
instagram.com/klnumismatics
Remember that the dies have coin alignment, and therefore the south end of the reverse die directly faces the north end of the obverse die as the coins are being struck.
Now think about a coin being struck off center between the south end of the reverse die and the north end of the obverse die and remaining stuck to the north end of the obverse die. Then think about where the partial brockage would occur and what it would look like when the obverse die struck the next coin. What you see on the OP coin is exactly what you would expect to see.
Yes, that makes sense. What I meant with the stems facing the wrong direction in my first post was if the partial brockage was the result from a non-off center normal struck cent which shifted north before striking this coin which would result the stems facing the other direction.
But the way the stems are facing in the OP coin was what led me to believe that the brockage was from an off-center cent like you said. The brockage being in the location where it is it does make sense like you said that the O/C cent was stuck to the obverse die when it struck the OP's coin.
Young Numismatist/collector
75 Positive BST transactions buying and selling with 45 members and counting!
instagram.com/klnumismatics
OK, thanks - I see what you mean!
Disclaimer: I'm not a dealer, trader, grader, investor or professional numismatist. I'm just a hobbyist. (To protect me but mostly you! 🤣 )
TTT with the answer.
Because the position of the stem ends did not change after the off-center strike the off-center struck coin must have been stuck to the obverse die somehow, which in my mind makes it an obverse die cap, even if off center quite a bit.
TD
@CaptHenway said:
I agree with you Tom, but I guess ANACS was leaving all possibilities open no matter how unlikely.
I am grateful for your help. Thank you.
what else could it be?
It couldn't be anything else. When I bought it, it was already slabbed with the description "Partial Brockage". Obviously, to me anyway, it wasn't a simple Partial Brockage. It was more.
now you have your proof!