Featured A Very Neat Read: The Full Story of the "Hofmann" Lincoln Cent Mule

The following is a counterfeit/replica of what some refer to as the "Hofmann" mule cent, which despite having the year 1959 it dons a "Wheat" instead of a "Memorial" reverse as it should have; below the two sides is the actual Hofmann cent, which itself has a questionable authenticity.

Reportedly, during the early-mid 1980s, a rare-documents treasure hunter and dealer in Salt Lake City, Utah named Mark Hofmann gained notoriety by "discovering" historically significant early Morman Church artifacts (including Mormon paper currency), some of which served to potentially change the course of Mormon recorded history. In addition, he seemed to somehow come up with very rare documents with signatures of America's Founders and signers of the Declaration of Independence, classical writers/poets, and other historical notables.

Hofmann easily found buyers and sold his treasures for multiple thousands of dollars to private collectors and Mormon Church officials. His documents were deemed genuine by professional museum curators, university professors and researchers, forensic document examiners, and even the FBI; this only furthered his reputation and the prices of his artifacts continued to sell quickly to eager buyers.

However, two potential investors whose suspicions started rising planned on meeting with Hofmann to inquire and authenticate some documents Hofmann planned to sell them. Incredibly, before the meeting was to take place, both men were sent pipe bombs; one bomb killed one of the investors which detonated at his office, while another bomb was sent to the residence of the other investor killing his wife.

No sooner did that happen that police soon learned of a third pipe bomb explosion, this one severely injuring Hofmann himself which detonated inside his vehicle. Who done it?

After police questioned Hofmann about the circumstances of the explosion, they immediately suspected Hofmann as the bomber at all three locations because his account did not match forensic evidence found in his vehicle. They believe Hofmann just carelessly handled his own bomb intended for another target, but why? (And how did he manage to pass a polygraph test given by the police? Perhaps he had taken a sedative to relax him; not sure if he was also tested for that after, but he should have been.) Why would Hofmann want potential customers of his rare and extremely valuable documents dead?

The answer: Because Hofmann was afraid he was finally going to be exposed as a fraud along with all of his documents he sold. In fact, police obtained a warrant to search his home and found several forging instruments and incriminating evidence leaving no doubt this brilliant man was deviously devoting his talents to a very complex criminal operation. New document examiners discovered there were similar writing styles on vastly different documents from different time periods, that the ink didn't match what was used during some of the time periods, and even how the ink had bled and dried into the paper. Rather than be discovered, he constructed pipe bombs with mercury switches that detonate when the package (and bomb inside it) is handled and tipped a certain way.

Anyway, when news of this 1959-D "mule" cent hit the news, Hofmann immediately took credit for it. In fact, he even claimed it was secretly confiscated from his home when he was arrested and it was never turned in for evidence. He did have a better-than-average knowledge of the coin minting process, and the man who initially claimed to have found it had a connection to - you guessed it - Utah. If anyone could have made this mule cent, it could have very well been Mark Hofmann; he did also make several fake coins before. But this egotistical psychopath could very easily just want to claim credit to garner more media attention, and after all, he is a proven liar. So who really knows if he made it or not. Hofmann was later convicted of murder and is serving a life sentence.

The Hoffman mule cent was sent to Treasury officials who deemed the coin was authentic, but the researcher there was actually a currency expert. (I believe the Treasury Department analyzed it a second time and again stated it was a genuine Mint product.) Professional grading companies refused to certify it as authentic, yet it sold a few times over the years, including just recently for $50,000.

Is it genuine? Who knows. I say, probably not.

 

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The first time I ever met with Fred Weinberg face to face I just happened to ask him his opinion on the 1959 Wheat Back... He simply and honestly just stated "it's not real.. Just a forgery".. He had once examined it himself.

 

The coin is unquestionably fake. In order for it to be real, you have to explain a few things:

1. Why was a wheat reverse die still around at the Denver mint in 1959? They should have all been retired as part of the design change.
2. Why is there only one of these coins known? Even if you can explain how the reverse die was even at the Denver mint, if it was installed in one of the presses by mistake, thousands of these coins would have been minted.
3. If thousands were minted, surely mint QC would have flagged them. They're pretty good at picking out errors, so, surely thousands of wheat cents struck in the wrong year wouldn't have all gotten past them.
4. What's with all the die polish? There should be other 1959-D obverse dies or 1958-D reverse dies with the same die polish lines if this were a genuine Mint product, but I haven't heard about any.
5. ANACS declined to authenticate the coin because they couldn't prove it was produced by the US Mint.

That said, this is still a cool piece with a neat history. If it weren't a $50,000 coin, I would love to own it.

See https://www.coinworld.com/news/precious-metals/controversial-1959-d-cent-mule-heads-to-auction.html

 

I am in the process of contacting Mr. Hofmann in prison to possibly hear more about his link to this coin. More to come...

 

What? Really? I also heard he lied about counterfeiting that cent!

https://www.pcgs.com/news/the-mystery-of-the-1959-d-mule-lincoln-cent
Quote "The coin then became available in a Goldberg's Auction in September of 2002; however, the coin was suddenly pulled from the auction as convicted forger Mark Hofmann claimed he produced this piece using the spark erosion process. Hofmann had read a column in Coin World discussing the Mule cent and sent a letter to his daughter from prison claiming he had produced the coin. The Secret Service later reported that they found no merit to Hofmann's claim." Closed quote

I wouldn't take his word for it if he actually responds!

Congrats on this thread being featured!

 

Well, I am hoping he will let me interview him. However, that doesn't mean I will believe him.
And considering the Secret Service said the coin was genuine, who knows what is true

 

Aliens!

It would be very interesting to hear what he has to say. I'm sure you're not the first person to ask him what is his story!

 

A book was published in 2004 called Numismatic Forgery by Charles M. Larson. The book is primarily about the means and methods of creating fake coins but Hoffman's exploits play a leading role in the background. Mr. Larson says he was Hofmann's prison guard and interviewed him extensively, albeit casually. The book is still available at a very reasonable price and is a fascinating read in itself. I gave a talk on the book and forgeries in general at my coin club last year.

 

Let us know @JCro57

 

It can't be real as there is only one. A reverse wheat die would have produced many thousands of coins, and if it had been discovered and the coins destroyed and 1 slipped through the cracks, there would be a paper trail of the destroyed coins,
for mint accounting purposes. The coin was never verified by any coin expert.
All of the experts believe it is a fake. Only speculators and the uninformed have given this infamous coin more value than it deserves.
Yes it's an interesting story, but there's no question about the coin itself. Not possible.
I have the numismatic forgery book. I was underwhelmed.

 

Any way I can borrow it from you?

 

PM sent. You can have this book.

 

It's not that it's not real because there's only one of them.

(there are many valuable rare coins and errors that are 'one of's'
that are worth $100K or more)

It's not real because it's a counterfeit.

 

Fred, when you observed it, what did you notice/observe about the planchet itself?
Could he or did he use a genuine unstruck planchet for this (whether it was Hofmann or not) or is the planchet also counterfeit in addition to the die strikes?

 

For those who have Netflix, there is an episode of Forensic Files about the Hofmann bombings and the backstory. Nothing on the coin, but a lot on his forged documents.

Season 5, Episode 5

 

Yes I know it is counterfeit, manufactured, fake.
I meant you couldn't just have 1 of them if it was a real coin made in production.

 

...that makes sense.

 

I assume the planchet he used was correct - they're
currently, and even more so back then, easily available.

The coin was not a struck coin, imo.

 

Both PCGS and ANACS (not sure if NGC ever did, don't think so) looked at this... and basically decided "no opinion." They weren't convinced of its authenticity, but also weren't sure it was fake either. My opinion: it's an extremely well made fake, though I'm sure many share that same opinion.

 

Of course there are 1 of a kind rarities.
But I can't think of any that were produced in a modern high speed coining production at the mint.