1885-CC VAM

Micro 'o' counterfeits and a strike-thru or two have been designated as VAM varieties.... now an alignment mark for locating the last two digits....... If the first two digits are floating around between near, normal, and far, how could spacing between the first two and the last two digits be achieved (using a constant alignment mark)?

I see that 1878 dated coins are consistent in date placement (as are 1879 coins in relation to other 1879 coins).

It is my opinion that all digits were removed from the master hub.... (If the first two digits remained, how are near, normal, and far dates possible)? How is the spacing between the digits kept so consistent? And the height does not suffer either as in previous issues of U.S. coins where this actually may have been the practice? I have seen such an effect on CBH, but I highly doubt that there were any date digits at all on the master hub used for 1880 and later... date digits can only be added to a die, not a hub, so the digits were either added to the master die (logical), or the working die (illogical due to labor intensive redundancy coupled with increased risk of error).

Oh I know that you didn't come up with that jazz Dave..... I think that if there were two digits added to an existing two digits, there might be some noticeable differences (at the junction of these two sets of double digits) in relief, or spacing, or height, or curvature, or tilt..... not what I see when I look at the smooth transition across the four digits of a slanted date, or any other date for that matter.... (all four digits were added simultaneously the way I see it).

OK, we'll take 1885-CC as a test case. 228,000 minted; given years of prior experience and what we know about what *can* be done on one die, it's not hard to believe that three or four total dies would do it.

Discounting "VAM-1," 3 major varieties are known (we'll temporarily pretend the coin which started this thread doesn't exist). None of the three appear to have the same date location, based on the position of the 1.

The OP coin is a bit of an anomaly in the date sense, as well - although the images aren't clear enough for decisive choices, the date location doesn't quite match my impression of VAM-2 or 3.

Idle question - would one think that a radial die crack might be a more immediately terminal condition than one running the circumference of the die? That's my impression.

No, quite the contrary. We've wandered off into the weeds, as you and I usually do, but it's all perfectly relevant to the coin in the OP. I believe it to be a previously-unknown (or unknown but unpublicized) obverse die due to the radial crack in the absence of the cirumferential cracks noted on other varieties. Our discussion of the date location and dash origin is relevant to this specific coin, because it'll help us figure out just what that coin might represent.

As far as the dash goes, Leroy's reasoning meets Occam's Razor in my opinion. I am curious as to why they might choose the second 8 for a location - this is worth further thought - but its' status as a "locating mark" for a date punch makes sense. Would a mark closer to devices be less likely to basin out?

I guess further clarification about the OP coin is up to mitchhailey, depending on whether or not he chooses to pull the trigger on it. Should he do so, we'd want closer inspection of the true date position, the shape and nature of the dash, and comparisons between any die cracks and the known locations of such on attributed varieties.

I believe I have seen dashes under both of the first and the 8's not just the second one, but not for this year/MM , though the second seems to be the one most found to have the dash under it.

As near as I can tell, zee, the only dashes known are all over the tenth denticle from the neck point.

That is because this originates in a singular master die, not the working dies.


To me, that reasoning is totally illogical, and is not worth any further thought.

I'm still waiting for close up's?