1883 1c PR BN

1883 Cent Production: This is the highest-mintage date of the 1880’s for both Proof and circulation-strike formats. The circulation-strike production continued the record mintages of the previous three years. The high Proof production was due to the increased sales of minor coinage sets. These sets included, along with the cent and nickel three-cent piece, one of three types of five-cent nickel designs. Collectors who ordered their sets early in the year got a four-piece minor Proof set with both the old Shield design and the new Liberty Head design. The new nickel lacked the word CENTS, which was added to a revised design included in the Proof sets by June. Collectors who ordered early had to reapply to get the five-piece set containing the nickel with the word CENTS. A number of dealers speculated on the popularity of the nickel five-cent pieces and bought many coins of this issue.

Survivability: 1883 Indian Head cents mostly went into circulation and stayed there. Most of the remaining examples are in very low grades. Mint State survivors are plentiful, but many were not cared for properly over the years. Gem survivors are diffcult to find.

Collecting Challenges: Search out attractive problem-free examples. Many of these will have mushy details due to extended die wear. Examples with crisp details are always preferred.

Collecting Circulated Pieces: The optimal collecting grade for circulated coins is AU-50. While the large mintage ensures plenty of examples in all grades, finding attractive examples in Extremely Fine and About Uncirculated is rather diffcult.

Collecting Mint State Pieces: The optimal collecting grade for Mint State coins is MS-65RB. The 1883 issue is similar in rarity to the 1880 to 1882 dates. On all highgrade examples of this era, beware of uncertified coins offered at premium prices. The practice of artificially lightening the color of a coin to full red is seen more and more often as the values escalate.

Collecting Proof Issues: As the high-mintage date of the 1880’s, 1883 holds the banner as being the common coin. However, survivability of the cents is quite low, as many buyers of the day were more interested in the nickel five-cent coinage. Dealers who had bought large quantities of the minor sets for the nickel five-cent pieces had quantities of the cent for decades. Many of these were stored in envelopes or mint wrappers, and over the years the coins toned to red-brown or brown. Some of these toned to the highly desirable wild iridescent-blue. Examples in full red are quite diffcult to find. Due to the higher mintage, early-die-state examples with cameo contrast form a smaller percentage and are a bit harder to find.

The best variety of this year is the Snow-1, which shows the base of a numeral 1 sticking out of the neck, below the first pearl. On a few other dies, a defective digit punch shows a bit of an extra 3 above the digit. Since this defective digit punch was pressed into a number of dies, it is not considered an important variety.