CU-50c-1973D-02 Rim Cud

Description

Cataloged as the second rim cud for the 1973 Denver Mint Kennedy Half Dollar, CU-50c-1973D-02 documents another instance of die rim failure at the Denver facility during the early clad-era half dollar production. The 1973-D Kennedy Half Dollar was struck in the copper-nickel clad composition that had replaced the 40% silver alloy starting in 1971, marking the denomination's third year in its current base-metal format. With two documented cuds for the 1973-D (this entry and CU-50c-1973D-01), multiple working dies experienced rim fracture events during the production year — a pattern not uncommon given the mechanical stresses concentrated at the die's peripheral edge, where the rim-forming collar and the die face meet at a sharp angle that serves as a natural stress concentration point. Cuds on Kennedy Half Dollars are visually striking due to the denomination's large 30.61mm diameter: the raised featureless blob created by metal flowing into the void left by the broken die fragment occupies a proportionally significant area of the coin's profile and is typically visible without magnification. The Cuds on Coins attribution service lists no cross-references for this variety. Gilroy Roberts's Kennedy obverse and Frank Gasparro's heraldic eagle reverse were struck on 11.34-gram planchets of 91.67% copper and 8.33% nickel bonded to a pure copper core. Denver's 1973 half dollar production was oriented primarily toward collector demand, as the denomination had largely disappeared from everyday commerce by the early 1970s. The "-02" suffix distinguishes this specific die's rim fracture from the -01 cud, and collectors interested in Kennedy Half Dollar die breaks can pursue both varieties as a matched pair from the same date-mint production run.

Attribution History

• Discovered by Pete Apple
• CU-50c-1973D-02; none.
• Expert attribution by Cuds on Coins

External References