SKH-1c-1971D-29 Spiked Head

Description

Nearing thirty documented spiked head varieties for a single date and mintmark, SKH-1c-1971D-29 on the 1971-D Lincoln Memorial cent was cataloged by Cuds on Coins on February 14, 2018. The trajectory from SKH-01 through SKH-29 spans roughly two years of active discovery work — the first entries documented in 2016, with the catalog expanding through 2017 and into early 2018 as variety specialists continued extracting new finds from the vast population of surviving 1971-D cents. Each discovery adds another data point to what has become a comprehensive census of die crack behavior across a large population of nominally identical tools: twenty-nine separate obverse dies, all manufactured to the same specifications and deployed under similar production conditions, each developing a fatigue crack at the same design feature but producing a geometrically distinct spike. No external cross-references have been documented. For collectors approaching the 1971-D spiked head set as a complete collecting objective, the catalog's growth into the upper twenties extends the hunt well beyond casual searching — identifying and correctly attributing SKH-29 requires the patient, systematic examination methodology that characterizes advanced die variety collecting, where each coin is inspected under magnification with directional lighting to reveal the raised spike and determine its specific geometric profile.

Attribution History

• Discovered by Bob Byrd
• Cross reference: none. 02/14/2018.
• Expert attribution by Cuds on Coins

External References