RWB

Larger dies were more likely to have invisible defects due to improper hardening, annealing and tempering.

Info will be published in my bi-weekly Coin Week column. (The Barber Collectors' Group also has permission to reprint it in their newsletter later in the year.)

Moral ---- If you are a coin dealer, do not drive a car.

Blasphemy! Burn 'em at the stake in front of the Cathedral - just like Esmeralda ! TPGs are Sacred. They do not have an obligation to explain their decisions to anyone or anything.

Yep, it is. Please let us know when you try some. Many copper alloys have or acquire "pink" tones, so assuming an aluminum-bronze alloy does not tell us anything. BTW the obsolete term "wire rim" usually meant a "fin." There is no fin on your cent -- it's just struck a little off center. The "cud" is missing from the posted photos. Please add one or two.

I scrolled though the Heritage archives but did not find a 1907-D with a defect as described in the letter. It was a quick look, so I might easily have missed something.

Does anyone out there have a defective 1907-D half eagle as described in this letter.....?

Regarding dealer examination of unusual coins. Members are trying to help another person save a lot of money - it's not working. Very few coin dealers are "expert" at anything. An almost literal handful are recognized experts in certain designs or series. Unless "The Three Dealer Amigos" that member VasquezJ visited are recognized experts in buffalo nickels AND have researched and seen a 1927 experimental nickel, their opinion is no more useful than that of the guy gaping at his cell phone screen who just collided with a lamp post. The only meaningful suggestion is for VasquezJ to submit the coin to NGC and let us know the results on its return. That gives all of us a little bit of information which we do not, now, posses.

But ----- There will be a tractor pull and a beauty contest among dealers....

This is not a coin. It is the plaster model Fraser prepared in August 1912. It was supposed to be the adopted design -- until Hobbs got involved and a spineless Sec of Treasury stuck his head in the sand. (See Renaissance of American Coinage 1909-1915 for details.)

The most likely explanation is that metal dust and grease built up in the first "K" eventually clogging the letter. (Compacted material can be nearly as hard as the die.) It's called a "filled letter" error and is more a curiosity than anything searched for by collectors. The Yekaterinburg [Екатеринбург] mint ( "EM" ) produced about 14 million 1-kopek pieces in 1852. Yours is heavily worn and might be worth $1-$2. Pieces from the Warsaw mint ( "BM" ) are scarce and worth a little more, but there is minimal interest in circulated pieces.

Do you see a "man in the moon" or a "rabbit?" Humans naturally imagine familiar shapes and symbols in random spots and structures. It's called "pareidolia." Pareidolia -- the tendency to perceive a specific, often meaningful image in a random or ambiguous visual pattern. The scientific explanation for some people is pareidolia, or the human ability to see shapes or make pictures out of randomness. Think of the Rorschach inkblot test.

False legend. Guns were carried out of necessity, and only then almost entirely by rural and farm workers. Each mint had a small armory containing several rifles, shotguns and pistols plus ammunition. This was locked and required 2 keys to open. Only guards/watchmen were authorized to have weapons or to access the armory. The guns were procured from the Army who retained ownership. They were uniformly old, used and outdated. At the time of the robbery is was common practice to put men who were too old, disabled or feeble to do mint work, on guard duty. One of my CoinWeek columns will deal with the robbery.

People could split half eagles, scoop out the guts, and insert a platinum disc, seal the whole thing like new. They also drilled holes through the edge and the filled with a bit of platinum wire, then reformed and plated the edge. Nothing to do with assaying. People wanting quick verification of gold would make a cut into the coin.

In a film or video production this is called "product placement" and is usually a quid-pro-quo (or maybe a squid pro garlic-lemon sauce) or a paid placement by a product manufacturer. (Think cars, trucks, foods, restaurant names, cigarettes used to be big on this.)

Neither. The official title is A Guide Book of United States Coins and the cover also states: "The official Red Book" with a trademark symbol.

There are no ducklings and that is a lake not "duck sauce." Please duck away from that magnifier - it is goosing your brain.

Identifying one of the 1927 "Special Strike" (actually, "Experimental" is the correct term) nickels is not exceptionally difficult. But, the examiner must know what to look for and how to do the examination correctly. There is nothing in the OP's comments indicating he has expertise along these lines. NGC should have it since David Lange and I discussed 1927 experimental nickels many years ago and agreed on all points. Read the book to find out the rest of the story. I've already done all the hard work of research, analysis, correlation, validation and publication. All anyone else has to do is borrow (or buy) a copy of the book and read a couple of pages. PS: "Satin proof" nickels have better detail than mirror proofs. Polishing invariably removed or suppressed shallow detail. This is also in the same book and is accompanied by illustrations of original matte (from the teens), satin (before July 1936), and brilliant (after July 1936) Buffalo nickels.

Lots of "price guides" are imaginary as to both "Price" and "Guidance." TPGs should NEVER be involved in buying, selling or pricing coins that they authenticate and grade. This is an obvious conflict of interest.

RE: 1927 Experimental nickels. See pages 35-36 in United States Proof Coins 1936 – 1942 by Roger W Burdette. Here is the opening paragraph of the section ---- “Chromium Plating of Working Dies. Mint Engravers and Coiners were constantly looking for ways to increase die life and reduce maintenance time. Throughout the mint’s existence, the primary emphasis has been on improving the quality and hardness of die steel, and reducing the amount of pressure necessary to strike good coins. The steel used for coinage dies during the 1930s was approximately 0.97 percent carbon, 0.21 percent silicon, 0.18 percent manganese, 0.019 percent sulfur, 0.016 percent phosphorus and 98.605 percent iron. This is similar to general purpose machine tool and die steel used in other industrial applications although the absence of nickel is curious. Changes in die hardening, especially the use of better furnaces and improved temperature control, resulted in better dies. But ideas for further improvement came from an unexpected source.” As for the illustrated coins, nothing in the photos indicate anything unusual or special; common date, circulated nickels.

Yeah,.... But the "butts" are listed under "hardware." Not a pleasing thought.

Neither you nor I know what fabric is in the holders or where it came from. If one looks at the items in Fentucky Mike's posted link, the samples are inconsistent. If NGC said they were burlap, then that is at odds with the promoter's descriptions and the truth about US Mint bags. Hence, my thought that NGC's writer simply used whatever word came to their mind, and that was it. The complete "package" is good evidence that nobody at NGC cared to research anything, or get an affidavit from the promoter. You can believe all the lies you want.

Interesting.

Update -- The same coin seller was pushing 1932 Eagles for $2,495 (MS-64) Friday, and had a copy of my Saint-Gaudens DE book on the table as a prop. This is the book published by Heritage Auctions with a large S-G HR DE on the cover. (There's no comparable S-G Eagle book....it never got written.)