i recently bought a 1878 cc pl and on the back I noticed a line that run at the top of United states, starting from the U of United and goes throught to the e of states. Has anyone seen or heard of this before?
I assume that you are referring to a Morgan dollar. Die cracks are very common on these coins because 130+ tons of pressure is required to strike them. Chris
Moreover, the particular location for the crack you cite - top of peripheral lettering on the reverse - is probably the most common place for die cracks on Morgan dollars.
if you wanna have some fun, go to VAMworld.com, click on Morgan VAMs by date, and try to figure out which VAM you have. a very educational experience, if you have not done this before.
Here is your first clue........ Is it a "long nock" or "short nock"? http://www.vamworld.com/1878-CC+VAMs Chris
There were a lot of 78-CCs minted, and therefore there are many varities for this coin (or "die pairings"). 29 or so. One way to shorten the list of possible VAMs is to click on a button like "sort by obverse design" or "sort by reverse design." Contrast this with the 1893-S Morgan. Only 100,000 minted, and there are only 2 varieties for this coin (VAM-1 and VAM-2). Every single 93-S came from one die, and every 93-S will have some tell-tale markings which are unmistakeable.
There is only one obverse die known, but there are two reverse dies known with different mintmark positions. Chris
Here is what I found....short nock, two die gouge on left wing on reverse, die chip on top of eyelid, die chip on right of wheat leaves.....VAM 27?Moines
