Interesting Find on Morgan Dollars at Different Mints

As I took one last look at my five Morgan dollars before sending them off to NGC, I couldn't help but notice something. Out of the five coins (two Philadelphia mints, and three San Francisco mints) the coins had their inter-mintmark differences, and their intra-mintmark similarities. So I decided to do some research and share my findings with you.

The Surface​

The first similarity and difference is that of the coin's surface. Unfortunately, my five examples are not a great reference (and definitely not a good sample to prove my thoughts), but having dealt with hundreds of Morgan dollars, I can use past coins for comparison.

Simply enough, S mint coins seem to have the most reflective fields, and higher grade S mint coins almost always have visible traces of die polishing. All three of my S Morgans have some degree of reflectivity, with one having a cameo PL reverse and normal PL obverse, and all three showing die polish lines on the obverse and reverse, regardless of being PL or not. However, every other non-S-mint Morgan I've owned or seen before has had very disturbed, unreflective fields, and that classic milky cartwheel luster.

So the summary about the surface: S mint coins are typically more reflective and show die polish.

The Denticles
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Another similarity/difference is the shape and uniformity of the denticles. The denticles are the teeth that encircle the coin and are connected to the rim. Morgan dollar connoisseurs will know that New Orleans mint Morgans always have a dirty, rough looking edge, but S mint coins strangely have more satisfyingly sharp edges. If you pull out any high grade S mint Morgan dollar, I bet you that the denticles will be really sharp and squared off cleanly, but a P mint or O mint Morgan dollar will have uneven and flatter denticles.

Summary on the denticles: S mint Morgans have very sharp and squared off teeth all the way around.

The Edge
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The third major similarity is the reeded edge, personally my favorite part of a Morgan dollar. You can guess where this is going: S mint Morgan dollars have sharper square edges, but they also have a reeded edge that is protruding from the main planchet, as opposed to P or O mint planchets that have a bevelled edge, and concave grooves that dig into the planchet rather than stick out.

Edge summary: same as the first two, a sharper edge and more refined ridges on S mint Morgan dollars.

Relating it to History
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Coins are, after all, a portal into a previous time, and everything that happens in the past leaves a visible mark on the future - in this case, the three aforementioned minor details on Morgan dollars. The major mints of the Morgan dollar series are P (Philadelphia), O (New Orleans), and S (San Francisco), so I mainly studied those to relate my observations with each city.

To start, Philadelphia. In the late 1800's, a massive industrial city, with a strong economy and an even stronger position as a successful American city. Railroad systems made it easily accessible to the rest of America and allowed for efficient transportation, being the number one textile-producing city in the world at the time brought huge revenue, and coal and oil refining boosted and supported all this activity. Within all this, a lot of money traded hands, but this is as far as my thoughts have gone so far with Philly.

Next up, New Orleans. The smallest of the three cities in population in 1880, it didn't have much going for it. The World Cotton Exposition occurred there in 1884 through to 1885, but it seemed to only ride the wave of innovation in the late 19th century, unlike Philadelphia, that pioneered that wave. Along with that, it had just gone through the largest war the US had seen, the Civil War, and it had unfortunately chosen the wrong side to support. Having been impacted heavily by its association with the Confederate states, it struggled through Reconstruction, and was not back on its feet soon, unlike the Union states. When the Morgan dollar started minting in 1879 with the O mint, it had just been 14 years since the end of the war. That's like 2008 today, so it's safe to say that New Orleans was not economically nor financially strong.

And lastly, San Fran. With the discovery of gold in 1848, the population skyrocketed, and it became the 9th largest American city by 1880. Along with this, immigration across the Pacific from Asia was strong, so the influx of population and money was very much powerful. A confident grasp of nearly all exported goods from the whole state made San Francisco a major shipping area, and its natural ports, harbors, and waterways made this possible. However, it was rampant with political corruption. Mayors and politicians were trading with each other thousands of dollars, getting favors, and generally being very selfish and not responsible with their city's money.

Now this is where I'm a bit stuck. My current thought is that Philadelphia, being the wealthiest of the three, should have been able to afford more dies, and therefore should have had the sharpest rims, perfect reeded edges, crisp details, spotless surfaces, etc. but that isn't the case in all aspects. San Francisco leads the race with the rims and edges, but its reflective surfaces are not a sign of wealth. PL or DMPL surfaces are caused by submerging dies in a solution with small particles that revolved in the solution. These particles carefully abraded the dies and smoothed the surfaces into mirror-like finishes. This technique was mainly used to preserve the lustrous finish of the coins, which means that the dies would not have to be replaced as often, which would not be a sign of wealth. Additionally, the excessive die polishing often noted on S coins is a similar sign because this was another technique of cleaning dies and returning some newness to them. These two common aspects of S Morgans show that the San Francisco mint was not receptive to changing dies when small problems occurred, and rather chose to save money and maintain the life of fewer dies.

The O mint Morgans have the milkiest luster, which shows the opposite, that New the Orleans mint rarely put the dies through this bathing process. You could say that this was because they could afford to produce lots of new dies, but based on its economic weakness and the flat coin details and overly worn dies, this was probably because they didn't bother with their coins' appearance and focused on simply producing the coins. The also have bevelled rims, concave grooves in the edge, dull denticles, and often worn details, even on the highest grade coins.

So anyway that was a lot of writing, pretty much to show how you can find out more about a city's economy or wealth by just looking at very minor details on a coin. If you have any more info to complete this messy train of thoughts, please share it! Otherwise, happy collecting to you all!