1868 2 center..."Incomplete D or Partial D"? I'm so confused...

[RI AL]

 

Now I know why I never identified the variety on my 2 cent piece. I"m squinting through "Getting Your 2 Cents Worth" (1994) by Flynn and trying to determine which variety of 1868 I have. I will send scans (but you guys know how miserable my scans are). Anyway, the "Partial D', or "Incomplete D" has me stumped. How do you tell the difference?

Under magnification, I believe ALL of "United States of America" is retooled, there is a light die break through the upper part of 186. I see no date repunching so this piece doesn't match any of the listed varieties

 

Well, that leads to my second question. Before I discovered the brilliant bunch y'all are, I sent a question regarding my 1834 $2.50 to the Heritage guys who do that and they have helped me out a lot in years past. I don't remember the specifics, but though I couldn't find my variety in the Fat Breen Book, or the little paper bound volume he wrote on $2.50's of the series, I sent the question. The answer I got confused me. It was something like "well...if you can't find your variety, then your coin is not a variety". That confused me. I thought the variety books, 2 cents, half dimes, seated halves and so on discussed ALL known varieties. Is it possible for a coin NOT to be a variety (unless there are none for that year/issue)? So confused... ...but what ELSE is new. Hope I'll have better luck with the 1795 half dime in an NNC slab. Is anyone interested in seeing a scan of that?? Kind of low grade...but it was affordable 2 years ago. I don't want to bore you...at least not today...

 

Hope everyone is enjoying the weekend!!

 

RI AL

 

WOW!! What a dirty slab! What do you use to clean them up a bit? THANKS!!!

 

 

[Prethen]

That "D" looks complete to me.

[RI AL]

Me too, at first. Then I noticed the upper serif (did I spell that right?) is missing.

[Prethen]

Yeah, you're right. I didn't notice that before.

[McKinley-migration]

RB?

old holder...

 

someone told me to never invest in the 'red factor' cuz they fade. this slab enforces that theory..

[Conder101]

The answer I got confused me. It was something like "well...if you can't find your variety, then your coin is not a variety".

That is a silly statement. EVERY coin is a variety, it is just a matter of identifying which one it is. In some cases there will be the products of serveral dies all identified as the same variety, but that is because a diagnostic hasn't been found to tell them apart yet. That's how new varieties are discovered. Someone finds a way to identify the product of a die that was not previously recognized as different and bang a new variety is born.

 

The D on your coin would probably be considered to be "incomplete". I believe the broken D has the top of the D broken open. (Open at the top like a U.)

 

The "recutting" you are seeing on the legend is probably Longacre doubling. That type of doubling is common on these coins.

 

I don't have the Flynn book so I have no idea if your coin is listed or not, and I'm sure there are still many die varieties that have not been described yet. I don't know how many are listed in Flynn but I would expect there to be between 10 and 18 die varieties for the 1868 two cent piece.

[RI AL]

Good afternoon, Guys.

 

Your input is much appreciated...as always. My Flynn book is 14 years old so maybe this "variety" is since discovered. I don't think I'll rush to buy the book, however. It's just that this "variety" stuff is so darned interesting.

 

Regarding Red/Brown...the piece IS red/brown. The color is lost a bit in my scanning so you're right...it does just look "brown". I don't know how old this slab is...I know I've had it for many years...but I do believe that it has held the coin's red/brown characteristics rather well.

 

Regarding the statement from the coin guy from the online dealer "ask" column regarding "varities",...yea...I had trouble with that answer too.....As Condor so aptly stated...every coin is a variety of some sort of other. If there were 2 zillion identical coins, and 1 with a slight alteration from the mint, it seems logical that there would be 2 "varieties". But what do I know...

 

Got to tidy up and then I will try to figure out my 1795 half dime "variety". Hope you don't mind if I post a picture...it's no beauty and in the slab at an angle but I would be interested to see if my identification as to variety matches that of you really smart expert-types...(I'll be an expert in my next life)...

 

RI AL Enjoy the day. everyone. Beautiful here in RI sticks...except for the 8" of yesterday's snow.

 

RI AL