Hi again! I'm slowing looking through a small coin collection I received after my dad passed away and I came across this 1905 nickel - it's not in good shape but I noticed the word "cents" on the reverse looked off. Its looks like there may be another "n" in between the c and e. To me it looks like another word is under the word "cents". My pictures are horrible and I'm going to try to take more tomorrow. Maybe I am just tired and probably sound crazy but I thought I would see if anyone has any knowledge about this coin. as always - thank you for any input!
The word CENTS was weakly struck. That's not uncommon with these. The weak "CENTS" has more to do with a soft strike than with wear in this particular case. As to wear - these coins saw very heavy circulation in commerce and as such, they're often found in low grade - even much lower grade than the example you have here, which really isn't bad for an average circulated example. Lots of times the reverse rims are worn off, which is not the case with your coin. I'd call this one a VG8, which per Numismedia makes it about a $4 coin by "book value" (though realistically in the marketplace, more like $1-2, I would imagine).
