Anyone here an error person?

[spiny]

I found this 1951 Canadian 5 cent with what I think is a long struck through area on it this weekend. What I'm having a hard time grasping, though, is how could the struck through area be under the legend, for the most part, but at the same time be quite heavy through the portrait? Whatever was struck through was more flexible on one side than the other?

 

[TJ]

I'm told neither I nor my baby sister were planned.

 

 

 

(Sorry, couldn't resist.)

[spiny]

[SilverDollarMan]

I have a few. That's a nice coin

[rexcat]

Hi Spiny,

 

It looks to me like that’s a raised line of metal running across the face of your coin, if it is raised, than this is not struck through. If a foreign piece of material gets between the plachet and the die as the coin is struck, the result would be an impression on the coin caused by the foreign object being pressed into the coin during the strike.

 

The die itself has the damage, maybe a hard piece of wire (or something) was struck through earlier, causing an impression on the die, the wire would have been able to flex down into the larger cavity of the portrait but not into the small cavities that form the letters, it just crossed over them like at the G and O. After the die was damaged, all coins struck with it would have the same features.

 

It’s a very interesting coin and it’s always fun trying to imagine how they come about.

[spiny]

No, it's definitely a depression through the portrait and under the letters, which is why it seemed odd to me that the object would conform to the tighter spaces of the legend, but not in the relatively wide open spaces of the portrait.

[rexcat]

O.K., looking at the close-up I can see it as a depression, the first photo keeps going back and forth from raised to depressed as I look at it.

 

I like the way the depression crosses the letters and doesn't distrub them, on the G and E it looks like only the open end of the G is mushy, but the backs of both letters look undistrubed. This is very odd indeed, cool looking, but odd.