Anyvody care to see and Accented Hair "Hub"?

From this CoinNews.net page: http://www.coinnews.net/2014/07/29/1964-kennedy-portrait-restored-for-2014-50th-anniversary-coins/

They pictured on of the original Kennedy Hubs that has the accented Hair Variety and mistakenly referred to it as a die. (A die would be in reverse whereas a hub, which is used to make the die, always looks like the actual coin.)



I think this is very cool. Especially given the rumors regarding the Accented Hair.

The latest Coin World says that Jackie disapproved of the Hair before the coins ever went into production so exactly what are the Accented Hair Kennedy's?

Was it possibly a re-engraving due to some flaw in the hub creation process?

And, given the fact that this is a HUB (which is used to make tens of dies), is it possible that the mintage is much higher than current estimates? (This one has my vote.)

Edited Hundreds to tens

 

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Neat post!

 

Nice article. Golly. You would think CoinNews would know the difference between a die and a hub.

 

Thanks for posting

 

19Lyds,

In reference to your questions:

First, a review of the timeline is needed. I would suggest using Gilroy Roberts’ REMINISCENCES ON THE CREATION OF THE KENNEDY HALF DOLLAR dated 04-29-1964 as a starting point, a part I will quote here:

“Both sides of the trial strikes received very favorable comment; however, Secretary of the Treasury Dillon wished to have Mrs. Kennedy’s opinion and wanted me to accompany him at that time. On December 17th, we met Mrs. Kennedy and Attorney General Robert Kennedy. Mrs. Kennedy was favorably impressed with the design on both sides of the coin but felt it would be an improvement if the part in the hair, on the portrait, was less pronounced and more accents were added. They also had in mind a design showing a full figure or half figure of the late President. There was simply not enough time to create new designs and medals, get approvals, etc. and have the new coin in production by January, 1964. I strongly advocated the simplicity and directness of a profile portrait as being the best possible arrangement for a handsome, outstanding coin whose beauty would endure and there could be no doubt as to the identity of the subject.

Mrs. Kennedy’s suggestions were carried out on the intermediate size and another trial die was made for the obverse. New trial strikes were prepared. Secretary of the Treasury Dillon wanted to see this second trial piece and on December 27th, I flew to West Palm Beach where the Secretary and Mrs. Dillon inspected the strikes. They both felt that Mrs. Kennedy’s wishes had been complied with and in their opinion, the coin was very handsome. It was decided to proceed with tooling up for production. The Congressional Act authorizing the Kennedy Half Dollar was approved December 30, 1963.

Time was fast running out and if we did not have working dies for Proof Half Dollars, the coiner would be unable to start Proof coin production which meant that up until the time dies were available some thirty or fifty employees would be without work. Extreme pressure was exerted to push this program through and by January 2, 1964, Kennedy Half Dollar Proof dies were delivered and our tremendous Proof coin production could get started. Some minor problems still had to be ironed out for regular production but by January 30, 1964, Denver had started production of regular Half Dollar coinage using the new design. Sometime during the following week, the Philadelphia Mint started striking regular Half Dollar coinage.”

So on your first question, on December 17th, 1963, Mrs. Kennedy “felt it would be an improvement if the part in the hair, on the portrait, was less pronounced and more accents were added. Mr. Roberts further wrote that Mrs. Kennedy’s suggestions were carried out and another trial die was made for the obverse and new trial strikes were prepared. Mr. Roberts flew to West Palm Beach on Thursday, December 27th so that Secretary Dillon and his wife could inspect the new trial strikes. “They both felt that Mrs. Kennedy’s wishes had been complied with and in their opinion, the coin was very handsome. It was decided to proceed with tooling up for production.”

An interesting point that is news to me is the date of the Hub in the article; it is stamped 12-28-63 (the day after Secretary of the Treasury inspected the new trial strikes). Could this hub not be a “working hub” but the “master hub” for the proof coins?

Your second question, if the hub pictured in the article was the “master hub” it looks like the lower serif of the “I” in LIBERTY is missing.

Speculating on what may have happened, maybe they made a second “master hub” to correct the “I” in LIBERTY but forgot to transfer the “Hair Accents” onto the new “master hub”. If this is what happened then it would matter when the “I” in LIBERTY was corrected to determine how common or rare the “Accented Hair” version is.

 

A master hub is used to make a master die. The master die is used to make numerous working hubs. The working hubs are used (as needed) to make working dies. It is doubtful that the working hub produced (as you say) hundreds of working dies.

Chris

 

This is true, but since all of the working dies DON'T have the same diagnostics, we should assume that not all of the master dies included them. Therefore, it is also safe to assume that the AH diagnostics originated on the working hubs.

Chris

 

Nice article. Good info.

 

Since there are numerous doubled die Accented Hair Kennedy's (10) which all have the common traits of the hair accents and the truncated serif on the "I", would it not stand to reason that at the very minimum, 11 dies were created from this single Hub.

I just question "why" there are so few Accented Hair Kennedy's yet so many.

 

11 working dies is not unreasonable. I was merely disagreeing with the OP's comment that hundreds of working dies could have been produced from one working hub.

Chris

 

I changed it for ya! From hundreds to Tens since at least 11 dies are known by CONECA.

 

Aw c'mon!! Don't do it for me. Do it for yourself.

Chris

 

Thanks for the reply Caleb as you're the reason I made this post in wanting to get some "unbiased" discussion going.

I do not believe that the hub pictured is a master hub and this is based solely on the number of AH Kennedy's which have been identified. Had this been a "Master" hub, then certainly the numbers would have been much greater since, as pointed out, Master Hubs produce Master Dies which produce Working Hubs which produce Working Dies.

I asked if the AH was possibly a Hand engraving due to some flaw in the Hub making process since this area is a "high" point on the design. I did not mean the "Master" Hub making process but only the "Working" hub making process and only a single working hub.

The other question was regarding Jackie Kennedy and her role in this particular coin. Coin World stated the following:

"On Dec. 17, Roberts showed a prototype of the coin to the president’s widow. He told ‍Lisot (the Roberts interviewer), “They wanted Mrs. Kennedy to see — this is
the portrait that is on the half dollar. And I had emphasized the part in his hair.
He had a great shock of hair as you recall, and most artists, when they did a Kennedy portrait, they made a lot of this shock of hair, thinking that’s going to help them to make it look like Kennedy, you know. Well, they were right, but they had a tendency to overemphasize this part in his hair. And Mrs. Kennedy looked at the coin, and she said, ‘Could you muss up his hair a little bit?’ “All right, I thought, that was a wonderful criticism. She was a bit of an artist herself, and I think that aspect of the likeness was the first thought in her mind. It was very helpful, so I mussed up his hair and sort of half hid the part, made it less obvious, which helped. It was good criticism so I thanked her, too, for that helpful hint.” "

Now, if you look at the part in Kennedy's hair, it just doesn't seem to be that obvious which in itself could be the result of "and sort of half hid the part" but that did not address 'Could you muss up his hair a little bit?'

After the above meeting, CW states: "The obverse design was revised to “muss” the hair and another trial strike made. Roberts flew to West Palm Beach, Fla., Dec. 27 to show the revised design to the Treasury secretary, who signed off on it.
(Note that Mrs. Kennedy was not shown the revisions or at least the article in CW and the quotes from the book indicate this.)

Is it "possible" that the hair accents were added to a working hub solely to get approval of the design and really had nothing at all to do with Jackie Kennedy?
(Did Mamie Eisenhower "approve" the Eisenhower Dollar design?) Or, as I suggested earlier was that working hub modified as a result of a weak hub impression?

I did some comparisons of the Accented Hair Kennedy against a regular 1964 Proof coin and could not really see ANY significant differences in the hair other than those accented hair highlights. Everything else (except the "I" which could have been the result of some finishing process for the hub OR an indicator of a failed hub making process) matches up hair for hair.

You know, this would not be the first time someone in the die making shop modified either a die or a working hub to "highlight" certain details of the coin. Look no further than the Washington Quarter proof (1952/1953) or the Jefferson Nickel Proof (1938). Both have been hand engraved.

I have no doubts that the Accented Hair Kennedy was NOT the result of Jackie Kennedy and I further expect that the coin WAS the direct result of a failure of some type in the Hub Making process which was then corrected by a technician.

The appearance of this coin in the early stages of production (with the original RDV-001) only testify to the fact that the US Mint was under heavy pressure to get these hubs/dies into production presses. The abundance of doubled die obverses and reverses backs this up. The quality control in the die making shop is quite evident by the shear number of doubled dies which exist for the 1964 proof and business strikes.

Thoughts??

 

Nope, I did it for you since hundreds of working dies "can" be made from a working hub. Possibly not on such a large coin but most certainly for smaller denominations.

Remember, proof coin dies only lasted for 2,400 coin in 1972. It's possible that that number was lower in 1964. Using the 2,400 number (for obverse dies) and the mintages of 3,950,762 coins for 1964, this means that the US Mint had to have made at least 1,647 obverse dies. CONECA accounts for 40 of those dies of which 11 are the accented hair die in various stages of doubling.

 

Looks like PMD to me

 

19Lyds,

Do you know when Lisot interviewed Roberts about the design of the Kennedy half dollar? Year and month would be nice. Also, is it published anywhere?

Caleb

 

I say "so many" because at any one time, there are always lots of these available.

Count your CONECA numbers again Doug. Yes, there are 22 references to ODV-001 but only 11 of those reference a unique Accented Hair obverse for a specific die.

I show:

1. MDO-001 (Master Doubled Die)
2. DDO-003
3. DDO-005
4. DDO-010
5. DDO-015
6. DDO-019
7. DDO-022
8. DDO-026
9. DDO-027
10. DDO-028
11. DDO-033

After this, ODV-001 begins with the DDR coins.
So I'll correct my number to say that CONECA accounts for "possibly 12" Accented Hair Dies which should include the regular "non-doubled die" Accented Hair Die (if one even exists) which could very well be coupled with all those RDV-001 DDR coins.

As for the number of coins produced from a single obverse die, the Authoritative Reference on Eisenhower Dollars Appendices states, in a letter from the US Mint, that in 1971 coin production, the US Mint reported that 2,400 coins "could" be produced from a single obverse half dollar proof die. Certainly sometimes more and sometimes less.

This means that "ideally" (given the CONECA numbers) 28,800 Accented Hair coins "could" have been produced although the actual "estimates" are significantly higher.