Want to subscribe?

Get access to all of these articles, and a whole lot more, with a Coin World digital edition subscription!

Two 1979-P Anthony dollar subtypes

In my “Readers Ask” column in the July 23 issue, I respond to a reader’s question about a “Near Date” 1979-P Anthony dollar. The design subtype or variant, the second of two for the year, is more clearly referred to as a “Wide Rim” dollar. The first design of 1979 is called both the “Far Date” and the “Narrow Rim” dollar. After a large number of those dollars were struck leading up to the coin's public release, U.S. Mint officials made the hendecagon rim wider and struck more coins at the Philadelphia Mint.

However, apparently, relatively few of the 1979-P Wide Rim dollars were struck. The Wide Rim dollar is considerably scarcer than the Narrow Rim coin, and auction results bear that out. “A Wide Rim dollar grading Mint State 67 sold for $1,527.50 in an April 2017 Heritage auction; an MS-67 Narrow Rim coin sold for $89 in a January 2017 Heritage auction,” I write in the column, available exclusively in the print and digital editions of Coin World.

Morgan dollars share common RPM reverse

The VAM-4 and VAM-28 1879-O Morgan dollars have different obverses but share a common reverse that “has one of the most dramatic repunched Mint marks in the entire series,” writes John Roberts in his “About VAMs” column in the July 23 issue. 

The repunched Mint mark is triple punched north and south. The bottom of one errant New Orleans Mint mark is found at the top of the primary mark’s opening, with the other misaligned stroke at the bottom,” John writes, adding, “Both varieties are eagerly sought by specialists.” Read how to identify the two die marriages in his July 23 column.

Unusual forms of brockage errors

In his “Collectors’ Clearinghouse” column, Mike Diamond writes about what can happen when a thin piece of coinage metal, already struck, remains within the striking chamber atop a new planchet and is struck again.

While the result can be a second set of normally oriented design elements, “These same thin layers of struck metal can also generate brockages if they are folded over, if they flip over, or if they end up between a planchet and the opposite die,” Mike writes. He illustrates several pieces that sport unusual brockages after being struck by these thin layers of struck metal, found only in the print and digital editions.