Newly discovered Franklin 50C stuck on Dime!

This is a neat story about how I discovered a major mint error. I volunteer at my local coin shop (Dakota Coin in Rapid City, SD) that one of my best friend owns. I come in on my day off and help out with the loose ends so the other two guys can get caught up on their week. One day one of the guys brings in a three ring binder full of lower end foreign and odds and ends that was an after thought from a deal that happened over ten years ago. We all looked at the binder and this coin piqued my interest right away, but the other guys said it was nothing........

I had just been looking at the first Stacks Bowers auction catalog and the off metal errors and I thought that this looked like the coins they had recently listed. I said "That's a real good error" they said "No way, its just a Franklin thats cut down". Its too thin for that I said. "Where is the reeding then?" well, I think the reeding is in the collar and this coin planchet never reached the collar. "Why isn't it perfectly round?'" I think the design would dictate where the metal was squished out! They still weren't convinced and it got busy in the shop. Later that day I pointed to the now flipped up and stashed coin and said "that coin is right as rain!". I put a merc dime on the scale 2.5 grams, then the Franklin... 2.5 grams.... then they started thinking. We looked it up in the Red Book and it showed 7000 bucks. Well, "That changes things".

We shot it off to NGC, mainly because of the edge view holder and held our breath. I started looking up auction archives on Heritage and only found one that they have sold and it didn't have a full date, just 196X and it was a MS63 and sold in 2007. Tons of Franklin halves struck on quarters, nickels, just one dime. One on eBay a 62, also without a full date. So apparently, it's not a common error and that it is also rarer that a small dime planchet would land on the date area and be fully struck. I wonder if this coin came from the mint in a big bag and the first person at a bank to see it pulled it as a curiosity and somehow set aside and kept for being odd.

So I check the NGC website about every day. Finally, Quality Control! Then Finalized, Imaged, Shipped! Heart pounding, do I look now? Hit the button and WOW! Not only did they verify it as a true error (which is all we really hoped for) they designated it a MS 63! I couldn't believe it. To think this was heading for the melt batch. Actually, I just received the coin yesterday and wanted pictures before I shared the story. Most of you guys know me around here as a copper head and thats my focus, but this is one of the top neatest things that has happened to me in this hobby.

So you error heads, does the full four digits help this coin at all? Either way, enjoy. Matt
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amazing find all four digits on the coin is better then none.
good $7,000 as it says in the red book!!!!

 

Heck yea the full date helps it!
Great safe.
Can't wait to see that in person.

 

That is a cool find and a great story. Thanks for sharing.

 

Thanks Duke. I thought you would think it was pretty cool.

 

That's a sweet coin! Good find!

 

What a great find! I'm curious, how thin is it? A Franklin has much higher relief than a dime and I'm guessing that, in order to fill out the devices of the portrait and the bell, the fields would have had to be pressed down to practically nothing.

 

Thanks oval_man. Yes, it is thinner all right but not as thin as you would think but it is squished out a little larger than a dime as well. It wouldn't register well in a stack of dimes. We really think the edge view holder is critical to do the detective work and ponder the creation of this error. I've learned a ton about errors over this for sure as well as Franklin halves! It was my buddy Lou that first thought it would be a mint state coin once we started looking at it based on the high points of the bell. M

 

Ah, baloney! That ain't no good. It's not even an FBL. J/K!

Great find!

Chris

 

I can see how the others thought it was pmd.

And as for not being FBL...lol

 

Sweeet find, ETCM has it at $7000 too...

 

Duke, I can hear Jerry saying when it comes to weak strikes "always buy the whole coin!" that would really play into the FBL angle for this error!.. LOL

 

Matt, that is the greatest story - what a find! And good for you and your persistence!!! Thanks for sharing!

 

That's the kind of find we all dream about. Nice find, nice recognition, nice persistence!

 

Very nice. Well done!

 

A great coin. I have a 1952 half struck on a quarter planchet. It circulated some before being retrieved from circulation. I've wondered how often it passed as a quarter compared to as a half.

 

Not only does the full date help the value, but it has the mintmark as well! (I'm surprised no one mentioned the mintmark.)

 

Of course. It's a cherry, with all the aspects a collector would want - certified, uncirculated, complete date and mint mark.

And to think, somebody got it for fifty cents. Or ten cents.

 

Wow, great find!!!

 

Great story... Even better coin! It really paid off going with your gut on this one.