In the modern coin world, it doesn’t get much more rare than this Ike! Here it is:
WOW!! What an Ike!! PCGS just up-graded it from MS60 to MS61!!
OK, OK, it’s not exactly beautiful, but it’s worth around $6,500.
That’s right, it’s a Denver 1974 Ike struck on a silver planchet. By 1974 the San Francisco Mint was in the second year of striking CuNi-clad Proof (CP) Ikes: rejected CP planchets were shipped to Denver for their production line rather than being scrapped. Somehow a few silver planchets got thrown into such a shipment in 1974 and went through the Denver production line. Most of the estimated 15-20 such wound up in Las Vegas where they were pretty badly beaten up before being recognized as strange because of their bell-like ring when dropped on a hard surface, their silver-colored rims and Morgan dollar silver appearance.
The owner of this specimen had it stored in a safe place but recently pulled it out just to hold it in his hands and decided to send it into PCGS for a possible upgrade from NGC MS 60. When he got it back in its new PCGS MS61 holder, he was stunned to see that it was a die-clashed Ike with a peg leg. Looking closer, he notices other strange features and shipped it to the IKE GROUP for our opinion.
Here’s what we found from our microscopic examination:
It is indeed a classic 74-D CB “Major peg leg”.
It is also a “Tight Double Talon Head” that almost looks like a bunch of carrots!
The nose and eye region is severely abraded.
The “E” is “Clipped” from die abrading used to remove the upside down U (UDU).
The crotch of the Eagle’s right wing shows “Eye-Clash” residua.
Heavily abraded Jaw Line image, possibly two lower jaw lines?
Heavy MDD on both sides (Machine Doubling Damage).
ABOVE, the “L” from DOLLAR – BELOW, “E” from LIBERTY
Last but not least there was a mysterious image on Ikes brow, an alien beetle invisible to all but Gasparro, LOL!
Sorry, I got carried away. The “beetle” is just a clash image from the 4th wing tip of the Eagle’s right wing, counting from outboard to inboard.