By CoinWeek …..
One of many rarest and most useful Lincoln Pennies will cross the public sale block on Sunday, January 5, as GreatCollections provides the best of solely two identified 1944-S Lincoln Metal Cents. This uncommon off-metal coin was by chance struck on leftover zinc-plated metal planchets utilized in 1943 in an effort to protect copper, then a strategic warfare steel. This main cent error, the rarest of its kind, was as soon as owned by Texas Rangers Main League Baseball group proprietor Bob R. Simpson, who was the primary collector to ever personal the whole P-D-S Set of 1943 and 1944 Lincoln Penny off-metal errors.
The Simpson 1944-S Lincoln Cent is graded MS66 by PCGS. Of the 2 identified examples, it’s the just one that survives in Mint State. When the Simpson Lincoln Cent assortment was auctioned in 2021, this coin bought for $408,000.
With greater than 50 bids thus far and a pre-sale present bid of greater than $300,000, CoinWeek expects it to promote for greater than $375,000.
Final yr, CoinWeek compiled its checklist of Ten Superb Lincoln Cents Price a Lot of Cash, the place we ranked the off-metal 1944 Metal Cents #7. As analysis into World Struggle II-era cash improves, so does our understanding of the Mint’s wrestle to maintain the coin presses working because the nation marshaled the manpower and equipment essential to combat Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan.
The Philadelphia Mint was the epicenter of those experiments, whereas the Denver and San Francisco department mints centered most of their effort on producing cash to fill the wants of their service areas. Simply because the 1943-D (distinctive) and the 1943-S (5 identified) are rarer than the 1943 Copper plain cent, so too are the 1944-D (seven identified) and the 1944-S (two identified).
Most 1944 Lincoln Metal Cents have been produced on the Philadelphia Mint, which additionally struck cash for international international locations. Which means some off-metal cash struck at Philadelphia have been from leftover 1943 blanks, whereas others have been struck on blanks meant for international use, such because the Netherlands 25 cent piece.
Because the Simpson 1944-S Metal Penny is the best of solely two identified and is an iconic coin in probably the most popularly collected U.S. coin sequence, the significance of this providing can’t be overstated.
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To look by GreatCollection’s archive of over 600,000 licensed cash and notes the corporate has bought, please go to the GreatCollections Auction Archives.
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