Why is there no mintmark on West Point minted pennies from 1974-1986?

Billions of pennies were minted at the West Point mint from 1974 to 1986. Unfortunately, they didn't have a mintmark. Why didn't they put a W mintmark on these coins? There has to be a reason. Were they afraid of hoarding of these pennies, especially in the first couple of years they were minted?

 

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That would be a great guess. I did not even know about it till last year. It was on this forum that I learned that the 96W dime was not the first modern coin minted there.

 

They may have thought it was not worth the cost of having a mintmark.

 

They were looking forward to THIS DAY when we would make a thread on CoinTalk about it.

This is their signal to begin the takeover by the Illuminati. We're in deep trouble now.

 

I would expect that a mint mark was not included because the West Point Facility was never considered a mint or a Branch Mint. It was originally a Silver Bullion Repository.

However, during the mentioned years, over flow coinage was in fact produced but it was produced as a "subset" to the Philadelphia Production. Much the same as the Silver Eagle over flow which also, does not have a mint mark even though its produced at a facility which "traditionally" puts mint marks on their products.

From the US Mint Web Page:

"The red letter date for West Point was March 31, 1988, when it gained official status as a United States Mint."

A Mint Mark is provided for West Point Production today but ONLY for Collector Coins.

 

My guess is the Mint doesn't want their "Special" and "Limited" collector coins from losing exclusivity and value.

 

The major reason West point was even making cents during that period was to bring up production because demand was outpacing the current production capacity at the other mints. If they had put a W mintmark on the coins there would have been added hoarding demand for the "new W coins" which the exact opposite of what they wanted.

 

Not that I don't believe you... but do you have a source for this?

 

Most of the '74-S cents were actually mixed with Denver mint coins to be released in an attempt to foil hoarders. It worked reasonably well.

 

All good reasons...so my 1974-W cent is worthless eh?

 

As worthless as your post.

 

Come on, where is your sense of humor. I thought the subject was neat as I never knew about the West Point Mint doing pennies. I thought it would be neat to see what one would look like. Man I tell you what, some folks in here are way to uptight...first get slammed for posting about a DD and then this.....

 

Fair enough, sometimes I just can not tell........

 

Cents were also minted in SF after 1974, but without the mintmark. And I remember vaguely the whole save the S mintmarked cents thing - because I did and still do.

 

I also did this when I was a kid...that is till I looked at mintage numbers....I still see them in circulation. I think I might start saving them...