DC-1c-1952S-03 Die Chip

Description

Third documented die chip for the 1952 San Francisco Mint Lincoln Wheat Cent, cataloged by Cuds on Coins on April 23, 2019. A die chip occurs when a small fragment of the die surface fractures and breaks away, creating a tiny void that fills with metal during striking to produce a raised bump or blob on the finished coin. Unlike cuds, which form exclusively at the rim from larger die fractures, die chips can appear anywhere on the die face — within letters, on design elements, or in the open field. The 1952-S Lincoln Wheat Cent was struck at the San Francisco Mint during the post-war era, when the facility was producing circulating coinage alongside its growing specialty in proof coins. Three documented die chips from the 1952-S date suggests that the dies employed for this production run experienced localized surface failures, possibly due to material impurities or stress concentrations in the die steel. The Wheat Cent design was in its forty-third year of production in 1952, with the simple reverse design of two wheat stalks flanking denomination text making die chips especially visible against the clean field areas. The DC prefix in the catalog number designates this as a die chip in the Cuds on Coins classification system, and the third entry for 1952-S indicates systematic documentation of die surface failures for this date and mint.

Attribution History

• Discovered by Chuck Newman
• Cross reference number: none. 04/23/2019.
• Expert attribution by Cuds on Coins

External References