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Routine Beach Run For Gold Snags Some Rare Copper Instead


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1 hour ago, GB_Amateur said:

You're at least the 4th person in the last year who has found an 1864 USA 2-cent piece and posted a pic here on the forum.  The $50,000 question (well, it's not worth *that* much 😁) is whether it's large or small motto.  (So far the rest of us have only had the lower valued large lettered version.)

Welcome to the club, although it's getting less exclusive all the time!  If yours is the rare small motto, though, then you've started a new club, and that clearly qualifies as 'exclusive'.  Hope that's the case.

I knew you’d ask that, so thanks for not disappointing me, Chuck. Still working on the obverse crud on the motto, but the “IN GOD” portion looks like large motto, but not disappointed in the least.

A little GB Amateur inspired numismatic history on the coin...

1864 being the largest mintage of the 95% copper coin at 19.8M (with an undetermined minority number of the Small Motto variety), it is not surprising most found are 1864.  That mintage steadily decreased to only 65,000 in 1873, its last year of circulation mintage.  Over 17M of the total 45M minted for circulation were returned to the mint, melted down and used as planchet stock for pennies.  The two cent piece was struck in response to the massive hoarding of all US coinage during the US Civil War and as a counter to the privately struck bronze trade tokens that were commonly used at that time for commerce in response to the hoarding.

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I like soaking mine in hydrogen peroxide. 

 

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39 minutes ago, Chase Goldman said:

So far, Andre’s Pencils...

What's that?

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You get it in a grocery stores. I don't know what it used for but I like to heat first and when when you put the coin it it bubbles like crazy and dirt pops right off. I only use it on copper coins. I soak it for a few hours.

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Andre’s Pencils look really good for cleaning. The looks great after you cleaned it.

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Congratulations Chase! that is the wonder of this hobby I enjoy so much, never knowing what you may find and where it is found sometimes becomes a mystery of how it found its way there. We can imagine so many possibilities but we probably will never no the real travel of that coin. Keep searching that area, birds of a feather do flock together. Happy Hunting!

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