Lot 2056

An absolutely amazing full obverse brockage and one of two dime brockages in the present sale. See 1827 for a full reverse brockage, providing a wonderful exhibit pair. The normal struck side has very light gray devices with slightly deeper gray fields. A few faint scratches and other minor surface marks are noted. The brockage side has very light silver gray fields and slightly deeper gray within the details. We have graded this example based on the normal obverse side. An interesting feature of brockages as a result of their manufacture is a virtually identical representation of the original coinage die, perhaps only with a slight lost of detail.

Three issues of Volume 8 of the Journal depicted this brockage on the front cover and the 1827 reverse brockage on the back cover. These two errors deserve to remain together.

This obverse brockage is attributed as JR-2 based on die state. The same obverse, in a much later die state, was used for the JR-3 marriage. This example has an extremely faint die crack through the outer points of stars 11, 12, and 13. There is no evidence of the crack between 25 as seen on the example of JR-2, above.

A brockage is a relatively simple error with a spectacular result. After a coin is struck, it remains on the (presumably lower) die when another planchet is fed into position. Certainly, it seems possible that the struck coin might stick to the upper die as well, much like a waffle sometimes sticks to the upper "die" of a waffle iron. This first struck coin, with proper obverse and reverse design features, serves as a new "die" when the second planchet is introduced. The press then strikes the second planchet, which receives normal details from the coinage die, and incuse mirrored details from the first struck coin. The resultant error is among the most highly prized error types from our first United States Mint. Among modern coinage from high speed presses, brockage errors are much more common. Those produced on the screw press are seldom encountered as human intervention would likely have caught these when they were made and sent the productions back to the melting pot.