Braided Hair Large Cent Altered Date 1845 -> 1815?

First of all, no cents were minted in 1815. An if a coin was minted in 1815, it would have been either Classic or Coronet head. The modified coin is a high grade (I would say XF).

I can't think of any other reason. It's not like they would trick anyone into thinking that this coin was actually from 1815.

I acquired this coin as part of a collection I purchased and had marked it as a fake at the time because of the date. I've recently been trying my hand at die variety attribution with some of my pieces and I ran across this one again and thought it was a shame to have ruined such a nice looking coin and why not see if I could figure out what coin had actually been destroyed. Anyway, right now I'm leaning toward an N9 attribution but like I said it seems a little iffy.

I agree that it's a poorly chosen fake and practice seems like as good an explanation as any for it. Although Dearborn's explanation gave me a good chuckle. Any thoughts on attribution would be welcome just for the heck of it.

I believe the reason for these 1815 alterations was to give collectors a complete date run, between 1793 to 1857. Over the years, I've also seen a few 1813 Classic Type cents that were altered to 1815's.

When the large cent series ended in 1857, with subsequently quick changes in the circulating small cent varieties and emergency Civil War tokens beginning to circulate, Americans became increasingly coin-conscious. Books on coins, auctions and dealer shops then raised public consciousness as well. Average folks were hoarding coins during the war years, too; this, in effect, prepping them to be coin collectors. Cents were the most hoarded, and cents dated 1815 were then noticeably absent; hence, the altered dates. Also, as the 1799 dated cents were difficult to find, there was a fair number of altered dates for that year, too.

Even today, many collectors are willing to fill holes in albums with copies of coins and even altered dates. I have an almost complete run of large cents, lacking only the 1799, and they're all counterstamped ... my criteria. I had an unstamped 1799 in that album hole, but I sold it when I acquired a 1798 altered date specimen. I couldn't bring myself to counterstamp either of them though!

Like I mentioned, some 1813 cents were altered, too. The 1845 cents were far more plentiful. Also, the objective of these then less sophisticated year collectors was simply to create an 1815, non-existant date. The1845 cents were a simpler alteration to perform than coins with rounded numerals, like 1810 or 1813. There's less reshaping of the numeral; this, unlike the simpler method of removing metal on the 1845's. Overall, these alterations were made more so to complete the "empty" year-run than to satisfy or fool serious collectors.

It's noteworthy that another, more common, early alteration was performed on the reverse of many large cents. The E in CENT was altered to a U, creating so-called "cathouse" tokens. I've never been able to find evidence that this was a serious intent. I suspect this alteration was done to make an unsavory joke.

Coins were also altered to make political statements and promote advertising. Large cents were by far the most economical choice for such ventures.

ExoGuy, I found your background on the 1815 alterations to be quite fascinating. Thanks for that!

On a lark I decided to search for 1815 large cent in an online archive of New York newspapers going back to the early 1800's to see if I could find any mention of the 1815 cent. I found the following wanted ad in the June 8, 1967 edition of the Ticonderoga Sentinel.



Hopefully not getting too far afield I found it really interesting to see the ad mention a 1910 SVDB Lincoln Penny so I just had to dig further. I found the following very interesting article by an apparently reputable author named Sol Taylor about this elusive coin. I hope it's acceptable to post a link as the article is somewhat lengthy.

https://scvhistory.com/scvhistory/s...r051008.html

Thanks again ExoGuy!

@Lahave56 ... Cool post! That offer would be strong incentive for unscrululous folks to create fakes. Back in 1967, $750 would buy a fine car.