Henri Charriere

I know some of our members object to the use of my term, "legitimate counterfeit," but private minters get by the coin stamped "COPY" by simply issuing it in double the thickness and weight and rendering representations true to historical detail in alternate metals, such as in silver for gold and copper for silver. Others enlarge their "coins." For example, my 1856 Flying Eagle Cent is a faithful reproduction -- but measures 3" in diameter. Likewise in the world of bars and ingots, uniqueness rules. There is only one "Eureka" bar and it's precise provenance and prevalence (none) are known as are its specifications.

Just now, nearly 90 days after your post, I received a formal letter from a moderator notably remarkable for its restraint in suggesting I cease and desist from irritating other members. I have no plans to let Matt G down. (As of this date, the two unique NGC-graded MS-68 FRENCH GOLD ROOSTERS 🐓 BOTH 1908 AND 1912 HAVE YET TO A SURFACE ANYWHERE ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH.)

🐓 The gentlemen are right! What's your Plan B? Q.A.: Dispense with the evidently inappropriate use of humor, including malaproprisms and non-numismatic-related verbiage, word-smithing, and the like, and re-immerse myself in corrosive domes, occluded gas bubbles, plating blisters, die dents, defalcations, die subsidence, Blebs (die erosion pits) die chips, interior die breaks and decarburization of die steel, etc. 😉

Easy. Moderation has carved out an exception for me: "cut him off from timely Notifications and his output will be limited and he will wander from the "next unread text" to another, to time indefinite." Obviously, the strategy has worked and I don't have any problem with Guidelines and policies invoked as of NGC necessity. I am terribly sorry if it distracts you. Perhaps you have noticed none of my contributions, most tongue-in-cheek, are outfitted with "like" tabs. Yhis is another ingenious ploy to limit validation of my views. I have nothing but the utmost regard for you and others I have or may have offended from time to time but I am wise enough to know participation is a privilege, which can be revoked at any time, for any length of time, without explanation or recourse. That is the fate, like an a albatross around one's neck, that has been accorded me. I am ok with it. 🐓

Good question. Best guess is it will be passed around indefinitely. Those are the ultimate fates of "bad pennies."

I love happy endings! 🐓

🐓: These numismatists talk funny! Q.A.: Tell me about it. It's all Greek to me.

This old thread made my day. I can never get enough of this hand-to-hand combat. Thank you, gentlemen, for a fascinating read. Good nite to all, and to all a good nite! 👍 🐓

🐓: Hey, Q! My proof is proofier than yours. Q.A.: Maybe so but the only opinion that counts is My Cousin Vinny's. This incremental grading craze at stratospheric heights, a/k/a Mint State, is as unfathomable now as it was way back when. Anybody still remember a time when a Proof coin, was just that: a Proof coin, and nothing else? Jeez! Carry on, gentlemen...

Surgically neutered coins are nothing new.

🐓: If the views expressed hereinabove by the gentlemen who've elected to weigh in are true, you're one lucky man, Q! Q.A.: Why do you say that? That's an old thread, you know. 🐓 : I am painfully aware of that but it's its content that I find particularly enlightening. Q.A.: How so? 🤔 🐓: Well, for one, you've broken every rule in the professional coin collector's operating manual. As noted long ago by the distinguished @Conder101 [by logical extension] you've continually placed your blind faith in people you don't know, places you've never heard of and in products you've never lain eyes on. No other collector has adopted your random, scattershot approach. Q.A.: True, but the result speaks for itself. 🐓: Does it? @VKurtB wasn't impressed. And whoever heard of retiring from coin collecting? When was the last time you went for an upgrade? This endless "wordsmithing" just doesn't cut it for me or anyone else for that matter. Q.A.: Complaint duly noted. P.S. Very informative thread with critique as valid today as the dates on which they were written.

Turns out I wasn't exactly right either. Puerto Rico 🇵🇷 is not represented on our U.S. flag and joins American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and the Virgin Islands as unincorporated territories. (Aside: I don't know about Alaska but I do recall Hawaii and Puerto Rico once had their own currency.)

[Q.A.: Been mulling this one over for a very long time. 🐓: Can't muster up the bluster needed to rebut it effectively, huh? Q.A.: Pretty much. There is a certain je ne sais quoi finality to @RWB's various pronouncements that make opinion sound like irrefutable fact. And the most confounding thing about it is I agree.]

That makes two new things I have learned in the past two years... FT stands for Full Torch and FBL stands for Full Bell Lines (and not Fat Bruised Lip.)

Very troo Dat! I checked. (Betcha can't name all six. I ain' stutter: there are SIX!)

The fact that you would do that speaks volumes about your character and upbringing. . [For a glimpse on how things turned out, see my light-hearted comments, "How It Really Happened," in the Off-Topic thread.]

Note to @Mohawk: I heard it on good authority that your dumpster-diving dinosaurs have a thing for those bright, shiny P's. 😉

The decline of the U.S. Mint dates to this time. They never should have stopped making silver dolls. 😉

But "50 Cents of Pennies," is not redundant, it's poor form. If what I read on the Forum recently is true, a cent is not a penny. Period?

[You've got that right. Upgrades and maintaing currency, are inevitable.]

If memory serves, it'll cost you. 🐓

[This is what happens when you're the first one on your block to get a brand-new coin and give it to your child to play with as a toy.]

I haven't a clew as to what you have but somewhere someone will take the diameter provided and the reeded edge, and run with it. Poor condition, but it could be scarce. I would be curious as to identification. Hopefully, you'll be able to accumulate information and develop leads. Best of luck! Oh, and Welcome to the Forum! 🐓

[My only question was when did Massachusetts, now a commonwealth, stop being a state?] Edit: 1780 seems to be the pivotal year.

[You've got to love a mystery going back decades that's solved with only five posts in less than 24 hours.]