Has anyone attempted to collect as many BIE Lincoln cent issues...

[James_OldeTowne]

... as are available? I think there used to be a club or something many years ago of folks who pursued as complete a collection as possible for "BIE cents" (somewhat akin to collecting all Buffalo nickels with 2-feather obverses).

[newprepper]

I have found a couple, but not collecting

[x2rider]

Sorry James , but BIE ??

 

[Coindude]

Sorry James , but BIE ??

Martin, the "BIE" is caused by a die break that is extremely common between the B and E in LIBERTY on the Lincoln Cents. Especially in the 1950's. Here is a picture of one.

 

[AstroTrain]

I had never heard of this...means I can look at my Lincolns for something new! thanks!

[Kurtdog]

The varieties have to be endless.

[DWLange]

These are not varieties, as they were not in the die when new. They are simply die states, and that's why the BIE fad of the 1960s ultimately collapsed as collectors learned more about how dies and coins are made.

 

At the Houston show a few weeks ago I purchased an amazing book in which the author had created hundreds of pen-and-ink drawings of each and every die break observed on Lincoln Cents. The book was published in the late '60s and is quite rare, but I bought it solely as a charming memento of a bygone era in popular coin collecting.

 

Reviewing coin magazines from that period reveals that the readers were extremely keen about reporting every little oddity that came their way. No one at the time, however, not even the editors and staff of the magazines, could explain many of the things that are now dismissed as nothing important. It was certainly a different time, but it drove a handful of individuals to actually investigate and determine the real causes of mint errors and varieties. We've come a long way.

[johnny9434]

i remember seeing a few of them years back. unfortanatly i havent seen any as of late. thanks for the infor dwlange, its good info to use again. best wishes

[HCumberdale]

Once upon a time I searched through over 100,000 wheat cents for such fantastic anomalies. At the time I considered it fun, though I think I wasn't really collecting as much as I was hoarding. There are a LOT of unusual anomalies to be found on these cents! I had hundreds of such "errors" at one time and I now own zero. I wasn't really collecting them to pursue a date collection, I was just putting away every example I came across!

 

I never heard of a club for the BIE cents specifically...though perhaps if I had my collecting style would have been more refined!

 

 

[Kurtdog]

These are not varieties, as they were not in the die when new. They are simply die states, and that's why the BIE fad of the 1960s ultimately collapsed as collectors learned more about how dies and coins are made.

They're die chips.

[RWB]

Shades of Spadone

[rmpsrpms]

If I find them in a BU roll I will set them aside, assuming they are not the only thing interesting in the roll. I have rolls and rolls waiting for me to do something with them!