Are the 1794 and 1795 half cents and large cents two types or four?

Type collectors generally view the 1794 – 7 half cents Liberty Cap, facing Right as one type coin and the 1793 – 6 Liberty Cap Large Cents as one type. But some well advanced collectors, with significant budgets, view them as each two or more types. The reason is that the 1794 and 1795 coins have significant design differences.

1794 Half Cent



1795 Half Cent



1794 Head of 1794 Large Cent



1795 Large Cent



In 1794, the relief of the designs for all of the half cents and most of the large was higher. The treatment of Ms. Liberty’s hair showed more detail and her portrait stands out further from the surface of the coin. In 1795, the relief was lower and the hair details are courser. Why were these changes made?

The reason is that Robert Scott (John Gardner also may have made dies), who receives credit for these designs, found that the lower relief prolonged the life of the dies. Without going into a great deal of detail, here are some general summations:

1794 half cents: Mintage 81,600, Number of major die varieties 9, Number of coins per die pair 9,067

1795 half cent: Mintage 139,690, Number of major die varieties 6, Number of coins per die pair 23,282

1794 Large Cent: Mintage 918,521, Number of major die varieties 65, Number of coins per die pair 14,131

1795 Large Cent: Mintage think and thin planchets 538,500, Number of major die varieties 9 #, Number of coins per die pair 59,833

# The nine die varieties include 1795 Breen (a.k.a. Sheldon 79) which was the experiment reeded edge variety which had a very limited mintage with one die pair.

From these numbers it is obvious that the first mint got more mileage out of its dies once the relief was lowered.

The question for most type collectors, is should they really be concerned about this? My answer is no. If you really wanted to get into this, you would almost have to collect and die variety set of 1794 half cents to have all of the designs. An expanded large cent type set could include the Head of 1793, 1794, 1795 and 1796 large large cents. All of these designs are a little different.

Needless to say, this part of a type set could get very expensive, especially if you have a goal of filling all of the slots with high quality or even nice (Fine, VF) coins. I am simply pointing this out to collectors, such as I have completed their type sets and might want something else to collect. I bought the two extra coins you see see here, but I'm going no further.

 

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I agree. My type set includes one Liberty Cap half cent and one Liberty Cap large cent. That, to me, seems sufficient to represent the type. Anything more than that gets very expensive and a type set that includes 18th and early 19th century copper and silver gets pricey real fast.

 

Don’t forget the reverses of 1794 and 1795! And lettered/plain/reeded edge!

Jefferson head does not count as it is not a US Mint product

 

I agree with this. It's not genuine U.S. coin, only probably a proposal.