I collect Large Cents and got this for xmas instead. I like it a lot but don't know much about it. Is there anything special about the date? (There seems to be a larger gap between the 1 and 8 and the 1 and the 7 while the 81 is close together) Is this some type of varitey? Also, how would this grade? Thanks
It looks like a no questions asked genuine piece to me. It'll be pretty easy to attribute with that date placement. If someone hasn't done it by tomorrow morning I'll look it up for you.
Here's the thing with the date. Sometimes the numerals were punched in one at a time, and sometimes they were punched in with a block punch. This one, it looks like the 1 and 7 were punched in individually while the 8 and 1 were punched in with a 2 numeral block. That's about all there is to it. Normal for the series to have dates like this.
Like Doug said, many dates hand punched, so you see variability in the series, especially earlier issues. These were produced in large numbers at the time since they were the largest denomination US coin for a number of years, so they were used for bank reserves. This also explains why so many high grade examples exist. For grade, I would say f-VF waiting a better pic.
Until 1840 they used individual digit punches for the dates, in 1840 they experimented with two digit punches and in 1841 switched over completely to four digit punches.
Nice coin. Next time you get near a coin store look at the Parsley United States half dollar die varieties. A good book.
Old thread, but why do some sources call the comet head (O106) an R2 variety, while others call it an R5? (Including my Overton book.) And no, I'm not getting confused with the O106a. But I must be missing something. @okbustchaser
https://www.busthalfprices.com/index.php Dave Rutherford's site not only has prices realized for bust halves at public auction, but the following Overton Errata Pages 3rd Edition https://www.busthalfprices.com/errata.php 4th Edition https://www.busthalfprices.com/errata4.php 5th Edition https://www.busthalfprices.com/errata5.php Anyone interested in collecting by Overton needs to spend 20 bucks and subscribe.
The early mint frequently made dies with the first two or three numbers in the date entered and added the last one or two digits when the die went into service. I have a die variety set of 1797 half dimes that clearly show this policy. For example the last “7” might be much larger than the first which indicates that two different punches were used to enter the “7”s.