1898-S VAM-19
Error
Description
Discovered by Walt McArthur in March 2019, the 1898-S VAM-19 Morgan Dollar is classified 19 III2 12 with a C3a reverse. The obverse exhibits unusual localized rounded edge doubling of the Phrygian cap at the lower right, below the cap ribbon. No other doubled edge of the cap, nearby interior hair strands, or olive leaf edges show corresponding displacement. The catalog suggests this localized effect likely occurred during die basining and polishing that accidentally caught this vertical edge. This mechanism differs from standard hub doubling where entire design sections shift uniformly. Later die states develop a tiny die chip at the neck point and at the lower right of 1, providing secondary markers for attribution. Die polishing lines in RTY of LIBERTY serve as the obverse die marker, and polishing lines in the wing-neck gap provide the reverse marker. San Francisco struck 4,102,000 Morgan Dollars in 1898. The 2019 discovery demonstrates that new varieties continue to surface even on dates studied for decades.
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