The 1917 Lincoln, Doubled Die Obverse cent is one of the major varieties in the series, listed as FS-101 in Bill Fivaz’s and J.T. Stanton’s 2009 edition of the Cherrypickers’ Guide to Rare Die Varieties of United States Coins. 

Stack’s Bowers Galleries offered at its Feb. 28 Baltimore Rarities Night auction the sole finest example of the variety — graded PCGS MS-67+ red.

The firm described it as follows, “Soft pastels of powder blue and pink frame the tangerine color that paints the centers of each side. The well-struck devices are suspended by smooth, matte-like fields blanketed by satiny luster. Beautiful to examine in-hand and technically exceptional.” 

Inside Coin World: The two 1866 5-cent coins with different alloys: Two different 1866 5-cent coins and Arkansas paper money that was redeemable in bacon, among other things, are among the subjects of columns in the March 25 Coin World.

It sold for a mighty $120,000. 

To put that price in perspective, a different example graded MS-67 red by PCGS, one of just two known in this grade at that time with none finer, went unsold at a reserve of $60,000 at a 2016 Stack’s Bowers auction. Since that offering, the PCGS Population Report records just one in MS-67 red and one in MS-67+ red, which allows for the possibility that the other MS-67 coin on the books in 2016 was upgraded to the offered MS-67+ red example. 

Bidders agreed with the cataloger who concluded that the top graded 1917 DDO cent “represents the very pinnacle of this elusive issue and simply cannot be improved upon.”

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