At the 2022 EAC Convention in St. Louis I had a table with 2 cases of my "educational" coins for display and discussion. One of the examples was my 1812 large cent counterfeit, a member of a "family" of fakes I wrote about in this forum and had an article published by Coin Week. Late Saturday a gentleman came by with 2 examples he asked I review; they were from a collection of coins he was assisting to sell and both had been marked as "electrotypes". He said he was showing them around to dealers there and suggested he bring them to me, but was told I just focused on counterfeits, not electros... Anyway, I was initially surprised by the surfaces of both, as there was light luster on both which my images don't show, but the surfaces were better than others I had seen. The next thing I noticed was the exact "beaded border" obverse appearance as all seen, and the "chip" in front of the face as well. Inspecting the edges there was no trace of a seam, but both were very squared off/ flat, and the rims sharp enough to practically shave with. So I showed and explained these elements and pulled my example from the case for comparison. He thanked me and said he had a couple of others he wanted to show them to, but came back later to take images of his and mine together. He then donated them to the growing teaching collection!
Any explanation as to why they were labeled electrotype? Did the owner recognize they were counterfeit and assumed electrotype? It sounds like you never met the owner, just the assistant. Cool but a bit scary story, thanks for sharing. Scary because these are getting too good for regular folks like me to detect.
Gotta say they’re good. But all together I see too many telltale signs. Another to open my eyes too thanks
You have provided a great service to that gentleman, as well as other collectors. Thank you for your work.
Jack, I saw a picture of you receiving the award. I didn't recognize you with the beard. Looks good - fit for a professor.
Possibly because of the flat square edges. The original coins were struck with and open collar and the edges are rounded, but most electros I've seen of the early coins have flat edges.