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 Replies: 16 / Views: 3,813 |
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Gday fellow coin lovers, If you buy the yearly coin book you may have noticed that the descriptions of the mint marks for the 1966 one cent are wrong ( see last picture of this post ). I am a proud 1 cent collector and I am here to set the record straight. PERTH - Second whisker from the right Blunt - all others sharp MELBOURNE - First whisker from the right blunt - all other sharp CANBERRA - All Whiskers sharp. Now you may think that this is the end of it ... but what is blunt really ? especially on a nearly 60 year old 2.6 gram 97% copper tiny coin. the dies get worn and the metal used was not great ( especially in the case of perths 1911 onwards copper coins being melted to make the one cent pieces ++ later melted to make the 2000 olympics bronze medals ) After looking at over 6000 1966 one cent pieces collected by me and family here in Perth under a microscope I can honestly say I don't know anyone who has studied this coin more than me . So I am not blowing my own horn but I have devised a more simpler way of telling the 1966 Perth apart from the rest. The descrption of the identifiers ( other than bluntness ) is also in the pictures below. but ill also sumerise it here: With the coin exactly horizontal draw a line from the end of the second whisker directly left if this line intersects higher than the point where the third whisker and first claw meet your coin is a PERTH ( also should look blunt but the bluntness varies).  If the line from the end of the second whisker drawn left intersects lower than the point where the third whisker and first claw meet its a MELBOURNE or CANBERRA  The gap between the first Whisker and the second whisker is about 1.5mm bigger on the MELBOURNE than on the PERTH & CANBERRA Below are more PERTHS for you to practise on. look at you go. now go and check yours :)    The below publication has had it wrong for over a decade - and does nothing to change it.  |
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New Member
 Australia
31 Posts |
Upload a close up of yours !
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
another example of a wrong description of the 1966 Australian one cent mint marks online  |
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
8569 Posts |
Very interesting info. I only have one 1 cent coin from 1966. Have never bothered to work out which mint. I don't like to strain the brain.  |
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Nice one Trigger - its looks to be a Melbourne ( slightly blurry trying to photograph these little guys without a digital microscope) .
It is probably the hardest mint mark out of any Australian decimal coin ever produced to pick with the naked eye .
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
8569 Posts |
Thanks Perthite. I tried to blow the picture up, but it gets very pixelated.
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Valued Member
Australia
319 Posts |
I have looked at my 1c coins in the hope of identifying the different mints. Unfortunately for the life of me I can't tell the difference between any of them which is frustrating.
Anyway, if the mints have deliberately made alterations to the dies to differentiate between them, why did they make the differences so subtle?
I am keen to collect a full set of all the different varieties of circulating decimal coins so I would really like to be able to positively identify the different mints. The same thing applies to 2c and 5c coins.
I have even bought a few coins from dealers who claimed that the coins were either London or Melbourne minted but they look to me to be the same as all the others I have.
Any suggestions please?
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Gday SallyG ,
The best advice I can give you is to go to a "Jcar" or similar electronics store and get a usb microscope that you plug into your computer for about 100-200$ . Then the very slight "mint marks" are much more easily observable.
They are real !! ;) good luck
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Also - not sure of you location- but if you in the east you most likely looking at Melb & RAM as the smaller run of coins was, in my understanding, minted for WA requirements. So not many made it over unless in the pockets of those having a holiday .
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
And in response to why they are so subtle is that it was more for quality control than collecting ease id imagine.
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
1852 Posts |
Very informative thread Perthite.  Unfortunately all my 1966 1c failed the challenge  |
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Thanks Machinman - Its one of those coins that goes under the radar but is essential.
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Moderator
 Australia
16470 Posts |
Quote:
Anyway, if the mints have deliberately made alterations to the dies to differentiate between them, why did they make the differences so subtle? I have always assumed that the main reason why decimal coinage used this "privy mark" system, rather than overt mintmarks (like a little "M" for Melbourne) was for PR reasons. The government went to great expense and fanfare to open the Mint in Canberra in 1965, touting it as Australia finally achieving full coinage self-sufficiency from Britain. But it turned out the new mint didn't have anywhere near the capacity to produce enough new decimal coins of all denominations in time for C-Day. They needed help from The Royal Mint, both from the branches in Australia and from London. But there was no need to shove it in everyone's face that the new mint wasn't big enough or fast enough - so the mintmarks were well hidden. But the coins still needed to be marked, obviously enough to those who knew what to look for, for quality control purposes, in case substandard coins from a specific mint started turning up in bulk quantities. I don't think even the coin collectors figured out the privy mark thing until several years after the coins were in circulation. All the attention of collectors in the late 1960s was still on the rapidly-disappearing predecimal coins But once we realised that different mints had in fact been used for 1966 coinage, we started looking for possible mintmarks. We were already used to "hidden mintmarks" in the sense of that roving "dot" on predecimal Perth-struck coins. I doubt anyone other than an avid coin collector in the 1950s and early 1960s would have even noticed that dot on their pennies and halfpennies, let alone been able to tell you what the dot meant. So the decimal privy marks essentially continued this tradition of subtlety. I don't think anyone in government at the time ever officially acknowledged that the "privy marks" were real mintmarks, or that our interpretations of them were correct.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
8569 Posts |
Here are some more 1966 1c I found in my pile of coppers. Sorry the pics aren't too clear, but the best I can do with my camera. 1  2  3  4  |
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Thanks Sap for your wisdom on this one,, I did not account for the prestige/pride factor ! That makes sense though . I wonder who coined the term "blunt" then if not the mint ?
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New Member
Australia
31 Posts |
Gday Triggersmob - I reckon number 1 looks like Perth but the others look to be Melbourne and Canberra ( number 4 is uncertain ). The digital microscopes on ebay are cheap as chips these days - just plug into your computers usb hole and you can get good close ups |
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Replies: 16 / Views: 3,813 |
Posted 01/08/2024 04:19 am
