Hey everyone.. I was just examining a new 1945 Walking Liberty Half that I bought recently. I noticed some odd lines that at first I thought were die cracks, but after looking at them, I think they are die gouges. The reason I think they are die gouges is because of the locations, lengths and radial like pattern. The first thing it made me think about was the 1957-D Washington Quarter with re-engraved tail feathers. In that situation it makes sense. So, if these are not die cracks, why would a mint employee engrave these lines onto the obverse? They appear to run from Liberty's arm/shoulder out into the field of stars. It just looks very intentional. Has anyone seen anything similar to this? Any comments or hypotheses are welcome. Here are a couple of photo's. The first is a close up of the area without highlighting the gouges/cracks, the second is with the highlighting of the affected areas.
I tend to think they are die cracks caused by stress from a worn die. The first thing I thought about when you ask why a Mint employee would engrave these lines was the Wisconsin Quarter. A disgruntled Mint Employee gouged 2 dies and now we have a High and a Low Leaf varieties. The lines looked raised and not straight enough to be man made, at least to me. I've never head of a variety on this but then again, I collect them but not a specialty. If there were more of them known maybe I'd change my thought process.
I've seen one of these before but it was not for sale. I'll go with the opinion posted above as the lines are squiggly and go in the direction of metal flow.
Thanks for your thoughts guys. The squigglyness of some of the lines is what made me think die cracks at first as well.
