Please help me understand more about the 1840-O Lib H.E. and broad vs narrow mill

fc · April 7, 2008 9:20AM

The goal of my post is to discuss the varieties of the 1840-O half
eagle and why i have confusion about this subject.

Background info taken from a book by Doug Winter.
-----------
Major Varieties: There are 3 varieties known:

Variety One: Broad Mill. The coin is 22.5 mm. in diameter. All have a
large oval mintmark which is placed over the VE in FIVE.
This variety is very scrace in all grades and becomes very rare in
AU50.

Variety Two: Narrow Mill. The coin is 22.0 mm. in diameter. The date
is slightly higher then on Variety three with the 1 closer to the
truncation. There are heavy raised die lines at the IB in LIBERTY. The
reverse is the same as on variety one. There are often faint clash-
marks seen on the reverse. This is the most common of the three
varieties.

Variety Three: Narrow Mill. The coin is 21.8 mm. in diameter. The date
is lower on Variety two with the 1 further from the truncation. The 1
shows light repunching at its base. The mintmark is small and round.
It is placed over the V in FIVE. There are raised die lines between the
border and letters of STATES. Many of the vertical stripe lines extend
into the horizontal shield lines above. A light clash mark connects the
the right wing and the lower beak. This variety is rare in all grades.
-----------

Here is a link to a coin that ANACS calls a Broad Mill.
According to the info above they are wrong. Notice the position of
the mintmark being above the V in FIVE.

This ANACS coin appears to be variety 3 due to the position of the
MM and the size of the MM.

I think this was not a one time thing because here are two more links
to ANACS slabs showing a Broad Mill coin: link and link2.
All 3 times the mintmark is located above the V in FIVE. On the first
link of the ANACS XF45 net graded coin you can also see the vertical
shield lines extending into the horizontal shield lines. (look carefully).
The large pictures do not show a clash mark on the rev between the
wing and lower beak, nor can i be sure of repunching of the 1 on the obv.

Moving onto NGC now. Here is a coin that is clearly labeled Large
Diameter which is how I think NGC labels Broad Mill coins:
link.
Ah! I thought to myself, finally the mintmark is in the right position.
Could i finally be looking at a Broad Mill coin? I say NO!

Notice on the obverse in IB in LIBERTY the raised die lines. You can clearly see one
going through the I as well as one below the I almost touching the
bottom of the B!

Here is another coin showing the raised die marks.
Another coin with raised die marks in IB in LIBERTY.

Well, now I am really confused. Two TPGs both showing coins that
to me are obviously not Broad Mill coins according to Doug Winter.
Is there any Broad Mill coins in the Heritage archives? Everyone that
is labeled so is incorrect, even the ones Heritage guesses at! Link
Heritage's guess at a broad mill shows the raised die marks in IB in LIBERTY.
Especially the one that is touching the bottom of the B.

Now I have 3 different opinions that are all wrong according to DW.

It seems you cannot trust the auction house. You cannot trust two
different TPGs. You must have a proper tool for measuring the coin
and being inside TPG plastic is a true detriment of owning one of these
Broad Mill coins. Or could it be that the TPG did measure the coins
and DW is wrong?!?

There are other mints that have Broad Mill coins and now i am questioning
their ability to accurately identify these. What is a coin collector to do
except think for themself?!?

Link to heritage archives showing their 1840-O half eagles. link to all of them.

I am going to post what I have and will add to it as the discussion
develops.

fc · April 7, 2008 9:24AM

Here is an obvious example of what DW calls variety 3 due to the
very obvious clash mark extending from the wing to the lower beak.
see obv for clash mark from wing to lower beak. notice the small O mintmark.

I do not see the raised die lines in IB in LIBERTY.
The mintmark is above the V in FIVE as it should be according to DW.

fc · April 7, 2008 10:45AM

man i should have put CAC in the title. :-| no action here. well i guess
be patient and moan about ebay and AT coins. ;-)

variety one: cannot find a picture for sure.

variety two:

variety three: (yet appears to have a raised die line in I in LIBERTY
but not the major one you can normally see easily touching the bottom
of the B. So i shall consider this coin not having raised die marks i suppose!)

RYK · April 7, 2008 10:55AM

There is an excellent article on the topic in the Norweb catalog. If I can fire up the scanner, I will post it here later. The scanner has been on the blink.

CaptHenway · April 7, 2008 11:27AM

Excellent questions, and I look forward to seeing them answered, but I know when to shut up and listen to the experts.
TD

DaveG · April 7, 2008 12:28PM

I'm not sure that there's anyone currently active on the boards who can address this question, so you might have to go directly to DW.

I'll throw in my own two cents, however:

I know some of the grading services have been slow to recognize some varieties of O-mint gold and even when they do, they might not use the same criteria that experts like DW do. (I know I've read several comments from expert collectors remarking on errors by one service or another regarding variety identification.) Perhaps what you are seeing are either the result of errors by the TPG (either mechanical or otherwise) or differences in how they identify varieties

Also, the NGC-40 example you show looks to me to be Variety Two, which is mid-way in size between the Variety One Broad Mill and the Variety Three Narrow Mill - perhaps NGC labeled the coin a Large Diameter because it is, in fact, larger in diameter than Variety Three?

Edited to add: Speaking of O-mint collectors, has anyone heard from Reece since late January?

fc · April 7, 2008 12:44PM

I'm not sure that there's anyone currently active on the boards who can address this question, so you might have to go directly to DW.

I'll throw in my own two cents, however:

I know some of the grading services have been slow to recognize some varieties of O-mint gold and even when they do, they might not use the same criteria that experts like DW do. (I know I've read several comments from expert collectors remarking on errors by one service or another regarding variety identification.) Perhaps what you are seeing are either the result of errors by the TPG (either mechanical or otherwise) or differences in how they identify varieties

--- very possible. i thought about that but ANACS for example clearly
--- confused the heck out of me.

Also, the NGC-40 example you show looks to me to be Variety Two, which is mid-way in size between the Variety One Broad Mill and the Variety Three Narrow Mill - perhaps NGC labeled the coin a Large Diameter because it is, in fact, larger in diameter than Variety Three?

--- I am not sure. If you visit NGC's website you will see 3 categories.
--- 1840-O "normal" has the most population of coins.
--- 1840-O "large" and "small" have the least. which i thought meant
--- that the large would be the broad mill and the small would be the
--- narrow mill variety 3. both of those groups, large and small, have tiny pops
--- which correspond to DW's thoughts on rarity.

--- i admit i am unsure. but i agree it is variety two due to the MM position due to not knowing the diameter for sure.. sigh!

Edited to add: Speaking of O-mint collectors, has anyone heard from Reece since late January?

fc · April 7, 2008 12:55PM

DW has been emailed and i politely asked for him to look at this
thread and comment back via email.

lets see if he has time to respond back anytime soon.

DaveG · April 7, 2008 1:21PM

fc,

NGC slabbed that coin between 9/01 and 7/03 (according to Conder101), so it's possible that their policies might have changed between then and now (that is, maybe they only recognized two varieties at that time).

I know that the first edition of DW's New Orleans book did identify all three varieties, but perhaps NGC didn't back then.

firstmint · April 7, 2008 1:43PM

I've long had an interest in these pieces, but am not an expert by any means.

You probably already know that the differences are caused from different diameter collars.

The question is - did the Branch Mints make their own collars or were they sent from the Philadelphia Mint?

The 104 reed collars didn't apparently last very long or they broke very soon. There is a "railroad rim" 1840 -O half eagle in the Bass III sale, lot 351 by B&M in May of 2000. This interesting coin is ex-Eliasberg where it describes the edge as half reeded, half plain, with expansion of the planchet on the smooth edge side.

With several different reeded collars (fine and coarse) and various diifferent diameters (assuming the planchets were uniform size at all Mints) then the focus becomes the collars and how they were created.

Does anyone have any precise details about collar production at the dawn of the steam coining press age in America?

CaptHenway · April 7, 2008 2:07PM

It is my understanding that, as a rule over the years, each Mint was responsible for producing its own collars, but it would not have been unreasonable for the Philadelphia Mint to have provided each of the new mints with a "starter kit" of collars in each size it was expected to produce. Thus, and this is mere speculation on my part, one of the 1840-O collars may have been a Philadelphia Mint product and the other(s) made in New Orleans.

Do any of them exactly match a Philadelphia Mint striking?

TD

firstmint · April 7, 2008 2:19PM

Some of the different collars used were from the previous style coinage of half eagles from 1834-1839.

The C & D Mints had used the old size diameter collars already, while the New Orleans Mint didn't have any gold production in the 1830's.

Perhaps the Philly Mint sent their old collars to New Orleans Mint to finally get them into gold coinage production.

fc · April 8, 2008 12:46AM

well my timing was off with DW. He was watching the big game and only had
his blackberry device to work with.

i will not quote him, just summarize.

1. assumptions based on photos is a tough way to go.
2. these coins need to be viewed outside of the slab side by side.
3. the width and shape of the edge is key.

that is about it in the short email. he was enjoying his night off and not in front
of a PC. I sent him a follow up email and i will wait and see if he has time to answer.
i also asked him about the collar questions in this thread.

---
some thoughts that came to mind... how does a collector get to view these coins
outside of a slab before buying one? seems a rather tricky proposition to ask a dealer
to crack one.

he did not comment on the obvious difference on ANACS vs NGC where the mintmark
is clearly positioned differently.

all in all i am still confused a bit an unable to locate a picture of a broad mill coin that
i can agree with to study the characteristics. i asked if he had a few shots or knew of
a place i could look.

fc · April 11, 2008 4:47AM

the issue of ngc versus anacs, and who has the variety correct
was never answered by DW.

Either way from what I am seeing is that DWs info in the first
thread is incorrect. Lets assume one of the TPGs is correct.

If it is anacs, DW has the info about the MM above the VE wrong.
If it is ngc, DW has the info about raised die lines in IB in LIBERTY
wrong.

interesting eh?

this of course assumes NGC's idea of large diameter is what i call
broad mill. 0.2 mm difference between variety two and three is
hardly a big enough difference to call it the large variety when
you have a 0.5 mm difference from the variety two
and a 0.7 mm difference from variety three.

Please help me understand more about the 1840-O Lib H.E. and broad vs narrow mill

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