Possible Real 1943 Copper Penny!?

Since you've already made up your mind, that's cool.But Google is very easy to use...Mike Diamond, recently resigned from Coneca..and yes he works independently. Chuck does some attributing for PCGS as well...owns coppercoins.com...author, etc.I'm only telling you because you said you want the best..but if you don't do a little research, that's hard to do.

These forums are a great way for you to learn, you haven't gone wrong in that respect. But you can never go wrong doing a little research on your own. I can show you examples of the TPG's making huge mistakes, but I can't say the same about Mike or Chuck.Remember, the TPG's are in it for the money..guys like Mike and Chuck for the love of the hobby.

If I were the OP and got such definitive opinions from two experts theres no way I would send it away and risk having it confiscated. Save your money and trouble youve heard from some of the best already.

No, the opinion wouldn't change on my part. I know the coin is fake from what I have seen - there is no chance it is real.

You are shocked that the Feds would want to investigate counterfeiters of what is known to be one of the mot storied rarities in numismatic history? Odd you should be shocked. It only makes sense to me.

First, the real coins sell for thousands and thousands of dollars. Employing the right methods, these coins can be forged much more convincingly than yours for only a few dollars each. I see a potential for very high, illegal profit to be made there.

Our coins and paper notes say "United States of America" on them for good reason - that is to make a strong identification that our government made them for commerce in this - the greatest nation on this planet. Counterfeiting those coins and notes weakens the economy for the greed of the few. It is an age-old method of making quick profit, but has been illegal for centuries. The Secret Service of the United States was formed in part to track down counterfeiters and prosecute them. And counterfeiting, as it were, is no different if making pennies or hundred dollar bills. The crime is the same, and the punishment is the same. Your piece is Federal criminal evidence. It is not a collectible coin, nor would it be viewed as a collectible coin by the authorities.

In some spare time (if you have any) do a little Google research on "Henning nickels." Short version is that a man was Federally prosecuted for producing hundreds of thousands of fake nickels. Many of those nickels circulated, and some still circulate today. People are STILL finding them, and this story dates back to the 1950s or 1960s. I am not very well versed on the story because I do not know or really care that much about nickels.

My pure speculation about your piece is that it was a test piece to see if a method worked, and it obviously did not work well enough to fool anyone, so the spoils were simply spent. It is exceedingly easy to circulate a fake penny, because - after all - it's just a penny, right? Who would fake a penny? Anyone who wanted to create a very valuable penny, that's who.

The slightly more detailed version of the fake pennies is that they are made using a vast number of techniques - all of them are very easily identifiable to the trained eye, and many of them just don't "look" right even to the untrained eye.

Some are made using a sand mold with metal poured into the mold. Yours is definitely not one of these.

Some are made using sparks to erode the metal. These are often quite convincing, but are always a little soft in detail. Yours is definitely not one of these.

By far the best way (and more difficult way) to fake a coin is to imitate the original technique of making the real coins - with a pair of steel dies and a LOT of force. Fortunately most people don't have tools lying around that can generate 39,000 pounds of force in under a quarter second. So, they do what they can to 'fake' that effect.

Cent planchets (blanks) are easy to come by for a buck or two - they often leak through the minting process and are found in change. So having a perfect blank is the easy part - but hardened French bronze isn't the easiest metal to strike, and almost all attempts at making a convincing coining die fail.

The only method I have seen employed that is very convincing, which I must note yours is certainly not made using this method, is using soft dies that are 'built-up' using a method I barely understand, then placed with the coin blank between them and shot with a shotgun. Yes, a regular shotgun. That provides enough immediate force to "strike" a coin, but this method is VERY consuming in time and materials, because the dies are often a one-time use, and take a long time to create. The method, I must mention, is also very highly dangerous (duh).

So back to the point at hand...

Your coin obviously has value to you. It would likely bring $50 or so from someone who collects counterfeit coins - I happen to know a couple of folks who do that professionally. Advising to send it to a grading service just to have them tell you it's fake is about the silliest advice I have seen given here in a long time. Anyone who gives that advice here apparently doesn't know anywhere near as much as they think they know about numismatics or US law. Really...just keep it. This one isn't a profitable winner, and holders honestly cost a couple of bucks through a coin dealer. There's no Earthly reason why you should mail the coin to anyone.

I do stand corrected. Somehow I knew this fact, but blew right by it in my fervor to stop a rolling train wreck. I could just see this person taking the ill advice given to them and sending this piece off to a grading service who, in turn, could catch a wild 'whim' to turn it in to the Feds - which they would be well within rights to do. If it were turned in to the Feds as a counterfeit piece, at the VERY LEAST the OP in this thread would never see the piece again.

If you sell the coin AS a counterfeit, it's legal. If you sell the coin as if it were the real thing, that's deception, and it's illegal. Making them is illegal regardless of intent without following a specific set of guidelines regarding HOW they are to be marked as copies. Basically if they look convincing as the real thing to a lay person, it's illegal to be making them.

I know that J.P. Martin buys counterfeit pieces, especially cents. I know of a few others who do as well. I tried to buy some once, and the price tag was too high for me. I don't see even convincing fakes being worth anything over $20 each, and I am commonly outpriced by those who have more interest in them than I. On occasion I have seen struck counterfeit Lincolns sell for as much as $100 each - but that's ONLY for the pieces that are convincing down to the microscopic level. This particular piece would sell for $20-$50 at best.

And a footnote that goes worth mentioning here while we are already on the subject:

An "altered" coin and a "fake (counterfeit)" coin are two completely different things. Although both can generate illegal activity, there is a fundamental difference between them:

ALL altered coins started out as genuine coins. People add mintmarks, change dates, and other details to make a common coin appear to be a much more scarce coin. They do the same thing to stamps by changing the color or border of real stamps. So "altered" is real, but changed to look like something they are not.

ALL counterfeit coins started out fake and never were real coins. Stamps and paper money are also relatively commonly counterfeited. At one time, sports cards (namely Mickey mantle and Michael Jordan rookie cards) were commonly counterfeited too. Totally fake, no part about them is real.

I saw some counterfeit sports cards up close one time, and I had no clue. I even asked how to tell the difference, and was told you have to count print dots in certain places to tell the difference. There was a real card displayed next to the fake card, and without the stickers on each identifying them as such, I simply could not see a difference.

I would think with today's technology sports cards are being counterfeited ad-nauseum, and are probably passing by the grading services as the real thing.

Fortunately money is FAR more difficult to produce outside the government facilities employed to do so.

i have pulled 3 or 4 of the fake ones over the years heres one of them

Thanks for all the great info CD.

Conder-I agree...that is very scary...

That was a good read.