RWB

As NARA documents are digitized and transcribed, more details will appear. For example, we now know that Isabella quarters were melted, then $3,500 restruck in 1896. Lots of details on the Columbian Exposition have appeared, etc. Once NARA reopens in the Spring we might see details on the trans-Mississippi medal and others.

This identical coin has appeared in several threads and has at least two similar answers. Please start only one new thread per coin. Multiple threads about the same coin will not produce improved answers - they just irritate other members.

That's one for the token specialists. Might be a picker's token for a quantity of agricultural product....?

Yeah -- Aren't we all. It was an interesting idea in 1909 (or 1862 for WG) but it has ossified to the point of meaninglessness. Of course, my opening comment is sarcastic, but the expansion of useless amendments to coin designs is very discouraging.

“Collectors Universe agrees to be acquired by investor group led for $75.25/share in cash 9:25 AM ET 11/30/20 | Briefing.com “Collectors Universe has entered into a definitive agreement under which an investor group led by entrepreneur and sports card collector Nat Turner, D1 Capital Partners, and Cohen Private Ventures will acquire all of the company's outstanding shares of common stock for $75.25 per share in cash.The transaction represents a premium of approx. 30% over the company's 60-day volume-weighted average price ended on November 25. The transaction, which was approved by the Collectors Universe Board of Directors, represents fully diluted equity value of approx. $700 mln and is not subject to any financing contingency. The transaction is expected to close in the first calendar quarter of 2021. Upon completion of the transaction, Collectors Universe will become a privately held company, and its shares will no longer be listed on any public market.”

....produce coins filled with mottoes, legends, privy marks, triumvir monetalis initials...and maybe sudoku puzzels?

Nope. Not a doubled die on any of the three threads. The coin is not copper, but an alloy of copper and zinc, technically called brass. The previous alloy was bronze made of copper, zinc and tin.

A primary impediment is mixing data measurement with subjective opinion. An AI system has no "opinion" - only an aggregate that imitates opinion to some degree of human detail. An efficient AI system will be compact; it "asks" the right questions....Few do that. It is too "easy" to scale up clutter from Terascale to Petascale flops, then issue a Press Release claiming some sort of AI "breakthrough." In system development data collection and opinion imposition are in opposition, so must be separated and analyzed individually. This follows my initial comment about patina and luster, etc., above.

Virtually everyone here will be glad to help other collectors. Much of the general information about dies and coining processes you read on VAMWorld is very good and applicable to nearly all other coins - US and foreign. (Member "messydesk" is a particularly good resource on Morgan and Peace dollars.)

The business approach is much like those who order hundreds of Silver Eagles, pick out the best and send them for "grading." The highest "grades" are sold for outlandish premiums and the rest sold a little above melt. Knowledgeable pre-screening ensures that slabbing fees are allocated only to coins that are good candidates for the highest grades, and thus the best profits. The rest are just a temporary hold on cash before being sold and reinvested in more Silver Eagles. This is also done with rolls of uncirculated common silver and bronze coins. Coins that did not "make the grade" are sold off cheaply to retail dealers, and those are the ones seen in discount slab boxes and in ebay ads like the one the OP mentioned.

You won't be able to enroll at the Mint unless you've had your shots. Just like kids at school, or the family dog....or...did I misunderstand "enrollment" ?

Look on the Newman Numismatic Portal site. You'll find a lot of manuscript letters and reports from the US Mint.

The video posted above is interesting, but seems to be trying to do too much and require a lot of user intervention. It's also way behind commercial recognition systems such as those used by TI and other technology companies. Suggestion: Start simple with fixed parameters of coins for basic geometry, then concentrate on differences not similarities. Use only unslabbed coins to develop the system parameters. In any event, I encourage the developers to keep trying.

The diagonal mark on the reverse is a scratch - possibly made with a knife blade. Die cracks follow weakness in a die's metal crystal structure and they are very, very rarely straight.

One might see some adjustments on the part of China during the next couple of years. More, later....

Impurities can be present within the alloy or as metallic salts, or individual metal crystals. A common example is the addition of zinc to a mixture of copper and nickel. This produces an alloy with lower melting temperature than just copper-nickel alloy. (Widely used in making die-struck counterfeit 3-cent and 5-cent coins.) In preparation copper and nickel are usually melted separately then thoroughly mixed, melted zinc at just below its vaporization temperature is added and quickly mixed, then the alloy is cast and cooled quickly. Remelting the Cu-Ni-Zn alloy is tricky due to volitization of zinc. The same applies to brass used for cartridge casings and was one reason the US Mints contracted "shell case copper" melting to specialty companies.

Thanks to everyone who took the time and interest to respond to this post. At present, data indicate there would be insufficient information dispersal to have a meaningful impact on accuracy or reliability of general numismatic information. Higher quality data also show that the proposed project is too small and limited to generate sufficient revenue to cover basic expenses. I will continue to make planning outlines and revise workflows, but not attempt to implement anything specific at this time.

Yep. Many businesses did only the minimum necessary to sell their product...if it didn't matter to the customer, it didn't matter to the producer. US Mint requirements for metal purity were more demanding than most, so they had to be very careful with the quality of metals they purchased. Their own refining was occasionally responsible for impurities. One of these involved NYAO using refining acid with a trace of selenium. The metal carried over into silver and made the metal brittle.

There are many minor varieties of official US Mint medals, but few explanations for this. Here is one possibility - reproduction and retouching to repair damage or wear from use.

RE: "The reason is that much recovered copper contained lead and other impurities which made it useless as silver and gold alloy." Explanation: Lead, antimony, bismuth, iron all made 0.900 fine gold and silver alloys brittle and difficult to roll to proper thickness without splitting and cracking. During the 1870s and 80s there were intermittent squabbles between the New York Assay Office, which refined a lot of precious metal used at the Philadelphia Mint, and the Mint's Melter & Refiner (Booth), and Coiner (Snowden). Defective ingots had to be reworked by M&R which wasted time and resources. The two factories prepared multiple agreements of cooperation from time to time, and then one or the other would "forget" about things and they would have the same disagreement again.

You can easily cross check on VAMworld's extensive variety listings. Here is a direct link to 1878-CC. Most have good photos. http://ec2-13-58-222-16.us-east-2.compute.amazonaws.com/wiki/1878-CC_VAMs

A couple of casual comments with regard to criteria. - Deep Cameo Proof/Cameo Proof Detection - Strong/weak strike detection (Not very accurate as of now) - Contact Mark detection - Toning detection for silver coins (Using the Sunnywood https://coinshow.us/sunnywood System) - Color grading for copper coins - Corrosion detection for copper coins - Patina/Luster detection #1 and #3 have been discussed here and elsewhere many times. Commercial SW can do these extremely well. For #3, "too well" might be the better description; good results depend on binning algorithms selection/designation. #2 is tough because there are few really uniform prototypes, coins are not produced with precision of detail as a goal - unlike industrial and IT components. Even the best detailed coins do not match sculpted designs, and modern digital technology almost breaks as much as it mends. #4, #5, and #6 are subjective or depend on standards not used or understood by coin collectors. "These are centered on ASTM E308: Practice for computing the color of objects using the CIE System, provides a full description of calculation of CIE tristimulus color scales along with definition of CIE illuminant and observer tables." They are possible, but will take a lot of simplification for coin collector use. #7 "Patina and Luster"are different things with entirely different causes, so I don't understand that one.

Agree with Mark. A rather evident counterfeit. Some might have trouble with it because everything is just a little "off," and a few parts are a lot "off."

A few visual samples and related conversation might allay concerns about unknown links. Tell us something about the project; what works what does not work; how AI is better than "Dumb-n-Dumber;" etc.