Error or damage 1 1

[Jennifer Weaser]

Hello I inherited my great-grandfather's collection and I have hundreds if not thousands of coins. I've been going through foreign and domestic as well as bills. It's been very daunting, so I will try and keep my questions to a minimum.

I'm hoping y'all can settle a dispute between my husband and myself.

He believes the attached picture of the penny is a strike error and I think that it is damage. His contention is damage would not have pushed over part of the 7 to make it look like it does.

Who's right?

Any guidance you can provide on where to start would be appreciated. I've just started entering everything into a spreadsheet and then I figured I would beg someone to look at it and say, okay, look at this coin from your spreadsheet and see if it has this mark or if it weighs this amount. I'm just completely overwhelmed and don't know where to start.

Thanks in advance!

[Greenstang]

Tell your husband you are correct, it is damage. Something has hit the 7 pushing
the tail over. There is no way for this to happen when the coin was struck.    
There is also damage on the mint mark. 

Almost forgot, welcome to the forum.   
Show us some more of your coins, we are glad to help.

Edited October 7 by Greenstang

[Jennifer Weaser]

Thank you for the welcome! Here are some of my favorites so far

[Jennifer Weaser]

[Jennifer Weaser]

[Sandon]

   Welcome to the NGC chat board.

   This is simply damage to this circulated 1979-D cent resulting from a hit by a hard object that damaged the "7" in the date. There is similar damage on the rim and other areas above the date, suggesting that this coin was run over by motor vehicles and ground into the roadway. The raised areas are metal that was displaced by the pressure that created the depressed areas. 

   Contrary to what you may have seen on the internet, it is extremely unusual to find a significant mint error in pocket change or among accumulations of coins taken from circulation. Please read the following recent article by a well-known coin dealer: Jeff Garrett: Fake News and Misinformation in Numismatics | NGC (ngccoin.com).

   In the future, please provide clear, cropped images of each full side of a coin about which you have questions and transmit them directly from your device rather than sending images of the screen, which are often too highly pixilated to see important details.

   What books and other resources are you using to evaluate the coins left by your grandfather? Do you have regarding U.S. coins, for example, a current (2025) or recent edition of A Guide Book of United States Coins, commonly known as the "Red Book"?   

[powermad5000]

Hello Jennifer and welcome to the forum! 

Many of us here could possibly have a tinge of jealousy at inheriting an extensive collection of coins and paper money! Believe me, we understand very well how daunting of a task it is to try to organize thousands of coins, segregate them, list them, self grade them, and check for potential varieties and errors. And to throw paper money into the mix just adds another layer. My advice on this is to not stress. I would first begin by segregating by denomination (dollars, halves, quarters, dimes, nickels, cents). Next I would take each denomination and segregate that by type (Dollars : Seated Liberty, Trade, Morgan, Peace) (Halves : Capped Bust, Seated Liberty, Barber, Walkers, Franklins, Kennedys) and so on and so forth. Once you are at this point, you can organize by date and mintmark and put them into a list. At the same time you are doing this, while the coin is in hand at the moment would be a good time to try to self grade the coin and write that next to the date/mintmark. Lastly, leave a column blank for potential value. I know it sounds not too complicated but for thousands of coins this could take months. We know. We understand this. Organizing this way, however, can help from constant page flipping and going back and forth on different lists of different coin types.

Being this is a coin forum, you can always ask your paper money questions on the forum over at PMG. They are another subsidiary of CCG (Certified Collectibles Group) of which NGC here is also a part of. They have a forum there just like the one here but it is for paper money. You can get to it at the following link I am providing for you :

https://www.pmgnotes.com/

Back to your coins, you should at a minimum get yourself a copy of a book called A Guide Book of United States Coins, 78th Edition, 2025. It is commonly referred to as the Red Book by its red cover, and you can find this book at most coin shops or coin shows, Hobby Lobby stores in their coin section, or online at Amazon, eBay, or Wizard Coin Supply. This book would be of critical help for you in organizing such a large amount of coins. It has basic descriptions of what to look for in self determining the grade of each coin (you do not need to be an expert to get a basic idea of grade from the description, just get close). The prices listed would be best described as a "base" as coin prices fluctuate normally, and sometimes spike or drop in response to hoards discovered recently.

Now, onto the first coin you posted, yes it is damage. It took a hit near the date numeral. Copper (or bronze) is a soft metal and enough of an impact to the surface is enough to cause the numeral to look like this. I suspect your great-grandfather kept it because it looked different in the date. The second Lincoln piece you listed is not a coin, but an Abraham Lincoln token. The next 1854 Braided Hair Cent (not penny) is circulated and worn and is maybe F 12. It looks to have original surfaces, but keep in mind, any coin could have had a past cleaning, especially older coins when collectors deemed cleaning their coins an acceptable practice to keep them looking nice. The six coins pictured in the grouping appear to be circulated, but none of them are considered to be "worthless". The Walkers would have to be checked for key dates, and the Seated Liberty half has some value attached even in that condition.  Gathering from what has been presented, it seems your great-grandfather collected circulated coins of common mintages that were relatively easy to obtain and being his age, may have possibly been able to obtain them for face value from circulation.

I hope what I have relayed to you here is of some help, and surely don't hesitate to return with any other questions or even just to share the ones you like the most. We all like to look at coins and discuss coins here and as far as knowledge, you have access (for free) in this forum to some of the top numismatists in the hobby. Here you will not be misled like much of the rest of the internet will lead you down the wrong paths.

Should you have to handle any of these coins in a "raw" state, or loose not being in one of the cardboard flips, remember to not handle the coins by touching their surfaces in which you can impart your skin oils onto the surface causing unattractive toning or future surface issues, but always handle a coin by its edges if you must handle it at all.

I also collect paper money in addition to coins as well, but I don't collect it with the same vigor as coins and am not as concerned in having those as pristine as my coins. You have some cool paper there just to say.

Again, welcome!

Edited October 8 by powermad5000
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