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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;samclemens3991, post: 26572595, member: 82181&quot;]The entire topic of black specks isn&#039;t of my invention.&nbsp; I first started collecting Seated coins in 1996/7.&nbsp; All my prior experience had been strictly with 20th Century coins.&nbsp; Like most collectors,&nbsp; I placed a great deal of emphasis on finding coins for my collection that were as close to &quot;as minted&quot; as possible.&nbsp; To me, it just seemed natural to transfer this idea to collecting 19th Century coins.</p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; Circa 1996/2005 there was a board online that I became aqquanted with that focused solely on Seated coins.&nbsp; Of course one of the things I did was post pictures of my first coins.&nbsp; Coins I called strictly original, as minted etc.</p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; People on that site were quick to educate me.&nbsp; I learned that to get rid of ALL the black toning from a coin turned terminal usually required too long of a chemical bath and would leave a dead lifeless appearing coin.&nbsp; Making the chemical bath shorter would restore a coin but if the owner looked closely at areas such as the denticles of stars with a strong magnifier you would find those telltale specks.&nbsp; All of my coins had said specks.&nbsp; I was crushed for almost a month and almost gave up on Seated coins.</p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; I also learned how to spot digger coins.&nbsp; Besides often times having a specific type of scratches, coins that had been in the dirt would have &quot;brown&quot; dirt embedded in the shield lines on both sides.</p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; Look at enough coins and you can develop quite an expertise for spotting coins that had turned completly black, Tiny coal black spots, almost terminal, browns spots in the same places and like I said, digger coins that had their own specific appearance.</p><p>&nbsp;&nbsp; I didn&#039;t discover any of these things but i have never forgotten the lessons others taught me.&nbsp; james[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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