Newfoundland 1941 Cent Varieties

DV - I don't think it is re-engraving or re-punching. On the 1940 all four digits of the date and all of the reverse legends are doubled in the same direction (south). Check the legends in the 1940 below. I might buy hub doubling, but it is too big a coincidence that they re-engraved or re-punched them all in exactly the same direction. I still think Machine Doubling from loose dies is possible since in both 1940 and 1941 the doubling does vary, first one digit, then two, then three, then four with numerous coins of each type extant. I grant you that it is tough to tell for sure.

Thanks for the collecting advice. I'll make sure I hold on to the two coins shown above.

wow 50,000 mintage and the price is only 2,000 dollars? I would expect it to be like 10,000

I really have not done any research regarding the Ottawa Mint, but I have done quite a bit concerning the period when The Royal Mint produced Canadian coinage.

During The Royal Mint era, the number of dies used as reported in the annual mint reports did not correlate very well to the number of dies found to have made coins dated that year. I think it's possible that the RM reported dies made during the year and labeled it as dies used. They also did not respect December 31st as the year end and sometimes continued coining into the new year with the date of the previous year, which could have also distorted the reporting of mintage figures. I am not saying that Ottawa did the same things, because I don't know, but rather that I take all mint reports with a grain of salt.

I also found in studying The Royal Mint era of Canadian coinage, that it is problematic to use average numbers. Sometimes that is the best you have, but again a grain of salt is required. In studying one cent coins (what I collect) I have found through random sampling that during The Royal Mint era individual die production varied widely from the average number. I suspect the same is true during the Ottawa era. We'll never know because, given the popularity of the RE varieties a random sample of 1940 NF cents is now impossible, but the actual mintage of the 1940 RE may be well above, or well below, the average number of coins per reverse die.

The reason that I think Machine Doubling may be a possibility on the NF RE cents stems from two things.

First the 1940 and 1941 RE cents do vary in appearance. Some only have one, or two, or three digits of the dates doubled. Could they be from different dies? Of course, but I have haven't accumulated enough of them to know. There also were not that many dies, particularly in 1940.

More problematic for me is the appearance of the doubling. Low flat doubling with no delineation between the original numeral and the altered numeral looks like Machine Doubling to me. Usually on re-punched numerals there is a visible split between the original and the re-punched numeral, particularly at the serif. In the attached article Stanton describes it very well (he uses the term Strike Doubling).

http://www.libertynickels.org/downl...Doubling.pdf

As for the consistent appearance over a large group of coins, I can see a scenario where a loose die in a die press is subject to the same set of forces on each cycle as the hammer die recoils. This would cause die to shift in the same direction on each strike and the dates and legends to suffer similar damage across multiple coins. The damage would vary over a large number of coins perhaps as the die became more loose.

I am not saying that I know for sure that I am right, but only that I am not convinced that re-engraving or re-punching is the answer. And yes, the both the 1940 and 1941 cents pictured above are mine.

Kurt, I mentioned the things that I considered re MD vs re-cut, or anything similar to Longare Doubling. I have to ag along with your thinking. Machine Doubling is , or has one thing that holds true in every case: The lateral displacement is equal, and even in the same die=rection, It doesn't wrap around the device(s).

Consider me still a skeptic. In the Stanton article (see the link above) it shows strike (or machine) doubling wider than the letters, wrapped around the corners of the letters, and present on some letters and not others. In fact, the close resemblence of what I have seen on the 1940 and 1941 NF cents with his photos first made me think that Strike Doubling might be the cause.

Again, I don't know for sure that Strike Doubling is the answer, but I respectfully remain skeptical that these letters were re-punched or re-engraved.