US Coins

What a Sacagawea $1 looks like in copper-nickel clad

The official auctions by Stack’s Bowers Galleries and Heritage Auctions at the August 2016 American Numismatic Association World’s Fair of Money had something for everyone.

As Bill Gibbs discussed in his feature on error coins in the September monthly edition ofCoin World, errors are among the most visually dramatic products to come out of the U.S. Mint and the ANA auctions had dozens of examples at nearly all price levels.

Here is one of three coins struck on the wrong planchets that caught my eye.

The Lot: 

2000-P Sacagawea dollar struck on an Anthony dollar planchet, AU-58.

The Price:

$7,637.50

The Story:

2000 marked the first year of Glenna Goodacre’s Sacagawea dollar design, which replaced the Anthony dollar that had returned in 1999 for a single year. A key factor making the new Sacagawea dollar different from its failed predecessor is its golden manganese-bronze clad planchet, which would replace the copper-nickel clad planchet used on the Anthony dollars that made it easily confused with a quarter dollar.

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Heritage writes, “This transitional off metal error presumably occurred late in 1999, when the Philadelphia Mint was striking clad Anthony dollars for immediate needs of commerce and stockpiling manganese alloy Sacagawea dollars for their much-promoted early 2000 release.”

Graded AU-58 by Professional Coin Grading Service, the error sold at Heritage’s Aug. 12 U.S. coin auction for $7,637.50. It had previously sold at Heritage’s June 2013 Long Beach auction for $9,106.25.

Keep reading about notable error coins sold during the 2016 ANA convention:

1989-D cent struck on copper planchet from before 1982 composition change sells at ANA

What a 1942 Walking Liberty half dollar struck on a quarter planchet sells for


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