Hello! Does anyone have any idea if this is just pure vandalism or an actual die break we are looking at. See photos. Thanks! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Looks like vandalism. Oddly the crack across star 7 does look real but I don't know of an 1828 with a crack in that location. Can you post an image of the reverse so I can determine which variety this is?.
It looks like a combination to me as well. While I might be wrong, I'm not familiar with a die crack in the field continuing along the face of a star. Vandalism will usually show up as indention into the surface while a crack is usually raised above the surface. All left of Star six appear to be indented or vandalism. Star 13 and right through the date also appear to be vandalism. But from stars 6 through 10 look like it might be a crack(s). I'm mixed from 10 to 13.
I agree, a combination and confusing also. Part of what appears as a crack goes under some stars, some of it over. With this much pitting, an obviously harsh cleaning could have caused part of it also.
There are a few dies that have a crack from the date through stars 13, and 12 but that crack doesn't go to the bottom of the date. All of the "cracks" look to me like just scratches except for the one through star 7.
I pulled out my copy of The Cent Book I picked up on a visit with John and Mabel Wright back in 95 and the 28-12 appears to show light cracks from stars 6-9 and 10-11 in the same locations as this.
A die crack would have raised metal . A scratch would be removal of metal would it not? The picture looks like some of both probily due to shadowing.
I don't have my copy of Wright available here but my copy of Noyes shows the obv of 28 N-12 was used for 2,3,4,5, and 12 and he doesn't show or mention cracks in those locations for any of those marriages. I tried checking the Goldberg site for the images of his 28's but they are not accessible right now.
