What is the "FIRST" thing you notice on this AU coin?

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The cheek looks usually flat compared to the rest of the coin when you look. The ring color looks odd as if it were soldered.

 

Look at the cheek and look at the area below the Colton balls. It has a similar color as it something hot was pressed on it

 

Coffee stain on the holder?

 

That puts it into perspective. Definitely whizzed as I've been saying all along.

 

Or some acid drops on the surface that was left to affectation the surface. This is similar to the paint coming off the car when the Three Stooges used Brighto. Makes old bodies new.

 

The cheek for me.

 

@C-B-D, you are correct, I worded this exercise badly as the actual first thing should have been the color of the image! Perhaps now you may wish to tell us what you see.

This coin was used in a Basic Coin Grading Seminar. When I looked at the actual coin (after some instruction), the first thing I saw is what the instructor wished for us to see. The first thing you should see is why this coin was used as a teaching coin. Unfortunately, you all have just the image. Once you learn an alternative way to actually examine a coin it gets really easy.

Several members have picked out many of the secondary details in the image yet few have taken in the entire view.

 

Good eye! The "extra star point" is just debris on the coin and the depression under the chin is a stain.

You are also correct, the coin IS NOT whizzed.

 

Yes it is

 

Metal removed from her forehead

 

I see a picture on her cheek.

 

If the photo is a prop in a grading seminar, then here is my WAG: If I'm grading a coin of this period AU, I expect to see at least half the mint luster remaining. But I can’t see mint luster in your photo. But mint luster is hard to photograph sufficiently. Idhair’s photo seems to show luster in the folds and along edges, but this could be just reflections. If there is only limited luster, I would grade it XF+.

 

That's not the look I would call whizzed. Not even close.

 

That discolored area on the cheek looks awful flat. The coin doesn't look whizzed but perhaps someone tried to smooth that cheek area out and then re tone the coin.

 

Whizzing is a specific term that was defined for all posterity in 1972 at ANACS. Previously to that, the ANA's written definition of Whizzing was "CHEMICAL CLEANING." We all know now that was stupid! Realizing that fact, an ANACS authenticator wrote a new definition based on the one characteristic he saw on all whizzed coins that separated them from harsh cleaning or polishing. That characteristic is not on this coin so it is not whizzed. Should you still disagree, let's discuss it further.

EDIT: Unfortunately, it seems from a quick Internet search just now that this universal characteristic found on all whizzed coins is only mentioned in a few of the articles. Even the PCGS article has neglected to properly explain the full characteristics seen on a whizzed coin that are taught in every grading seminar I have been in and I hope (but doubt ) all the professional working at the PCGS know. That may explain why there is so much confusion with mechanical alterations done to coins. All the "Johnny-come-lately" authorities who were not around during the infancy of professional authentication and grading in this country never learned many of the basics and were free to make up their own.

No point in any more discussion. Just as the "Johny-come-lately" professionals have made AU coins magically become Mint State, they have muddied the waters about cleaning, buffing, polishing, and whizzing. That's too bad.

 

Look how every high point is evenly slightly flat and how the edge of every tic and bag mark is rounded. Call it what you will, slightly whizzed if it was mechanical or polished if it was by hand but it's definitely been whizzed / polished

 

We just don't agree on what whizzed is. No big deal. I like the term messed with.

 

I notice doubling on the eye. Or maybe I,m seeing double today.