Value of 21 missing penny major varieties

[fred lever]

And getting back to Auto's theme, seeing i'm supposed to be an "expert" on pre-decimals, I went through the list and then had some argument with myself about some of them.
I'm not sure about the 1922 and 1929 Indians having any more rarity than the English most observation by count puts I/E at 50/50%. They are of course both VARIETIES of the date.
Agree with the list then up to 1930 but not sure of the 1930 pricing, but then how could you know, they don't come up on fleabay every day! Leave as is.
Agree, agree until I get to the 1952's. Well what a muck up with hubs and dies faults , idiots whacking punches into hubs and dies and hubbing faults and god knows what. There is a "wedge" 2 that is DISPLACED UPWARDS and David Briggs feels was one DIE only. The 2 is clearly higher (not tilted) than others and out of line with 5. Possibly only less than 100,000 pressed and much harder to find than the other rubbish. Maybe should have a premium? Not sure what you would call it, "hi 5 wedge"?
Then agree agree with rest. Maybe we should drop the term MULE for the 55 and 56, and use HYBRID? There is only 1 Mule in the Australian series the 16 half. (A mule has a side from some other country).
I wonder about the 1951 5G "no pl long 5"? Maybe just a die fill?
I wonder about the 1941 3D " dot top of 5"? maybe a just a die flaw?
Hmmmmmm. You can see why i gave up printing a varieties book or even trying to price things.
The more you look at pennies the more differences you see and those bloody dots have about 100 different positions depending on how finitely you measure the position.
I'm just about back to thinking, that say for the 1920 there are only TWO varieties: English/Indian, and rest can be attributed to DIE types, die 1, die2, die 3 etc etc for the reverse dot differences. It like the 1942 Indian obverse with I under the king. ONE variety but at least 6 different HUBS with hand punched I different positions. You cannot call each one of those a VARIETY, just identified as OD1, OD2, OD3 and so on. Sorry wandered a bit there. Will do a magazine article about this variety/die/hub thing.
Good work Auto something to think about.
Fred.

[Basil]

The other interesting thing Stan mentioned regards collectors of the time 1920 to say 1930's.
My reading tells me that coin collectors round then were pretty thin on the ground, particularly if they wanted uncirculated coins.
The common folk like me may have collected the coppers mainly British but anything over that would be spent on unnecessary things like food and rent!

Fred.

Yeah,Stamps seemed to be the go back then,times were extremely tough,stating the obvious,particulary from 1914 thru to the late 1940's before Oz. Economy got some momentum in the 1950's.
Family Friend(of my Parents) was a Stamp/Coin/Bullion Dealer from the late 1940's thru to the early 1970's and often said Coins(other than Gold) were barely 10% of his Business until the feeding frenzy of the 1960's when they overtook Stamps in popularity.
Don't close the Book on the origins of the 1930 Penny,lots of research by very knowledgeable people was done in the 1960's(and possibly late 1950's) on where and how it came into being.
Gilbert Heyde in particular and the Numismatic Society of NSW in general spring to mind as far as my neck of the woods go,also Journalists in Melb.(Age and SMH IIRC) were also chasing details on the 1930 Penny but i think these were more opinion pieces than cold hard facts. 
Why these published documents/reports have disappeared is hard to explain but i'm sure they will turn up in someone's collection and make their way to the Internet eventually.

[fred lever]

Basil your family friend pretty much echos the thoughts of people that I have spoken to over the years (1950's to 1990's). I wish I had asked more questions while chatting in their shops but you don't think of that sort of thing at the time. Of course they are all gone now! That estimation of stamps/coins/bullion percentage seems pretty right to me, coins were just an  after thought compared with stamps. There was a peculiar social angle where stamps were considered to be every-mans hobby rich or poor while coins were a "rich mans " pursuit, hence the high end collections plastered with gold and silver and rare issue examples. There was also a schism between the coin collectors and the mint. The people that actually made the coins and knew all about them had nothing to do with the people that collected them, the divide was that wide. Only a few people bridged that social gap that is lowered them selves to talk to the "chaps at the mint", the factory. Of the hundreds of people that worked at the Mint (Melbourne) only Mullett ever wrote in public about the people, the place and the coins. That fact is remarkable when you consider other hobbies such as Radio, aviation and automobiles, where endless numbers of folk wrote about their industries with data, specifications, about the factories the methods, where stuff was made, who did it, and all available in articles, books, web sites information that goes on and on.
The Societies in Numismatics unfortunately had almost no contact with the Melbourne Mint and in general know nothing much about how coins were made and who made what. You only have to read the society journals to understand even the Museum folk had nothing to do with the mint, the very place the coins were being made! Very, very curious. You would have thought the society people would have been down there with bells on to get the latest gen on what was happening. Later on the Canberra Mint and the goings on there( circa 1970)  would have sent anybody running for their lives and of course now the Mint is a very different open communicating place. Too communicating some would say!!
Yes, I have endless newspaper clippings and references mainly from Melbourne and all centred on the latest finding of a 1930 penny and how much they were worth all around the 1960's. Pity someone did not have the brains to ask the people that were actually making the coins what was going on. So much for journalism.
Fred.

[serenitystan]

There was very high security back in the day..You could not just rock up at the mint and ask to buy some coins..The state authorities were asked to ensure the efficiency of police supervision in the locality,and a military guard of four men was on duty at all times. A guardroom was situated inside the door where three of the guards remained,while a forth did sentry duty in the street by day and in the passage at knight..The guard was supplied by the Royal Australian Artillery..Upon pressing a bell the Visitor is scrutinised through a ''peep-hole'''in a large heavy gate. After satisfying the guard that entry is required for Legitimate purposes the visitor is admitted. Once inside the gate the presence of guards is always obvious. In the main foyer of the building the visitor is required to sign the visitors book, and with a few exceptions most of the signatures appearing in the book are those of Bank Officials. At no time is the visitor left alone in the building,and must always be accompanied by an officer . As part of the security arrangements,even those working within the building are NOT allowed into every section..Bars protecting the entrance could be seen glimpses of service bayonets.....

[Basil]

There was very high security back in the day........

No doubt,especially after the Sydney Mint was closed,it(Sydney) had a reputation of alleged corruption,cronyism,and general slackness,Melb. Mint didn't want to be the next to be closed and lifted their game considerably.
After saying that the Melb. Mint did have regular Visitors in the lead up to 1930 and after,where possible they were tracked down via 1960 Ads in the Age Newspaper along with former Mint employees to see if they could shed some light on the 'great mystery' of the 1930 Penny. 
Mint employees were not allowed to comment at that time so any article referring to direct quotes is a fantasy piece,that's why the Age Journalists chased former employees,that's where the 'myth' of the coin swapping began,from a former Mint employee.That doesn't mean its true but if factual it must have only been a handful of Coins involved as AFAIK no one has came forward to verify it other than the family of a Military serviceman who's 1930 penny,not UNC,was auctioned in Sydney in the early 1970's.
As an aside,even Harold Holt was asked to find out the origins of the Penny after a long lunch with a Fairfax  Political Journo. around 1964-66,that's how much the Coin was in the Public's psyche as we headed to Decimal Currency.AFAIK nothing came of this request which is not surprising as he was at war at the time with the Treasury and senior Mint officials over many issues including the Silver content of the proposed 50c piece,Treasury eventually won when they got Billy McMahon(then Treasurer) to withdraw it from circulation.  
Interesting topic which is still current today and i know of at least one Book on the subject that's being prepared at this very moment,Author wants it printed and ready for release in 2029 as he is worried he might not still be around then.

[nealeffendi]

Even if mint employees couldn't publicly comment they could surely make comments once they retired (or just make off the record comments). With Melbourne closed (1969) they were all FORMER employees and I doubt some form of Official Secrets act applied to them with lifetime gag orders or whatnot. Besides Mullett interviewed the staff and basically came up with zip (who can remember any details of some routine task among hundreds of similar tasks done 30 or 40 years previously).
That not a single gentleman or society matron in Melbourne ever came forward in the boom of the 1960s to show an Unc 1930 penny that they had swapped as a schoolgirl/boy on a school excursion to the mint in 1930/31 (or that their father had brought home after a mint tour) is telling that the "swap a penny" myth is just garbage. Most visitors to the mint in the Depression were not poor and unemployed but from solid middle class (secure jobs, kids in private schools etc) backgrounds to whom a penny was small change and easy to keep so the other myth that all the swap pennies were spent to buy bread etc in desperate times is ludicrous (especially as 70% of all workers were NOT unemployed even at the worst of the Depression).
Basil, that outlier of the family of a military serviceman, any details to confirm that it actually was swapped and not a misunderstanding by the family? I'm presuming that as it wasn't the serviceman himself putting it up for auction then he was probably long dead and what the family claimed was at best hearsay.

[Basil]

Neal,your point about Mullett is a good one,he was quoted some years back in print as saying he can't say with any certainty if the 'swap' happened or not and in general how the 1930 ended up in circulation.
My comments re Mint staff were related to 1960 articles,they were not allowed to comment,confirm/deny,speculate or have any opinion at that time on any Coins,not only the 1930 but also the 31 dropped Indian which was starting to gain attention, ,articles that quoted them were false.
As i posted before the Auction for the 1930 in the early 1970's was at the Paddington Town Hall,i was there,it's origins may be a Family thing or added by the Auctioneer to attract attention as the general consensus at the time was that they entered circulation via Mint swaps,telling factor was it was not UNC so i won't argue there,just pointing out a point of research for anyone with the time to pursue.
The thing i object to is the current practice of presenting Opinion pieces as facts with little substance other than joining dots,the 1930 was heavily researched in the 1960's,and possibly before, but apparently that research 50 years later means nothing.
I understand the rise of the 3rd party graders in the 1990's has meant a reference point for all Coins and where are the 1930's in the better grades?,looks like they don't exist at this point.
However i firmly believe a swap did happen as most Coin enthusiasts in the 1960's believed,but probably only a handful of Coins involved and the rest of the 1930's Mintage entered circulation via normal means later in the 1930's.
Just my opinion,i may be correct ,partly correct,or i may be totally wrong,but just present some facts before disparaging 1960 researchers such as Gilbert Heyde and his cohorts.

[autocoupler]

Thanks to all for the comments and discussion. I haven't been able to read the posts till now, we were choo chooing on the Ghan  :yahoo:

Just a quick reference to the 1930 English obverse, I think there are only three known, one of which is graded by PCGS at XF45. I remember seeing an image of one of the other two, and it would have graded VF+ IMO, so this means that two of the three known coins are around gVF. I think it's amazing that from a small sample, two coins were plucked from circulation in such a relatively high grade. 

About three or four years ago or more, one of these coins which I think was from the Benchmark collection and probably the one graded by PCGS, was for sale at $300,000 from Strand Coins in Sydney. I don't know if it sold at that price, but such a figure would back up what Stan and Neal said in relation to an imaginary value for a coin in UNC, if one actually existed.

One of the six 1930 Proof pennies was recently sold by Coinworks for $1,150,000, which would lead one to think an imaginary 1930 English obverse penny in UNC would surely need to be at that level or higher. So the value of this one requires adjusting  :good: Have also updated values for 1952 wedge serif and 1922.

[fred lever]

Hi Basil, your opening line in your last post and regarding Mullett, I quote, "he was quoted some years back in print as saying he cant say with any certainty if the 'swap' ever happened or not and in general how the 1930 ended up in circulation", is very unfortunate as it implies to anyone reading that post, that Mullett had little information about the 1930 coin. I had to go and get his  book on the Mint  just to refresh my memory and am sitting here with the book on my lap as I type. So that people do not get an erroneous impression about Mullett and dismiss his knowledge; he devotes SIX pages of the book to the production of the 1930 penny, page 11 to page 17. From page 11 to 14 he covers the tooling, that is the hubs and dies in excruciating detail tracing the parentage and passage of various dies from foundry to production. In one short paragraph  on page 15 he discusses the chances of a "visitor" being issued with a penny and details why this is so unlikely owing the circumstances at the time. Then in page 16 he discusses the number of 1930 pennies from production detailing which die types were used with a lot of detail regarding exactly how such a count can be done and concludes on page 17 with his tally or total as he calls it and what die types they were. Then he continues onto the 1931 pennies. That is hardly being uncertain as to how the 1930 got into circulation!!!
So, far from a "quote" saying he had little idea about the 1930 pennies regarding being swapped or how they "ended up in circulation" we have 6 pages of hard copy discussion direct from his book "Australian Coinage" telling us with some detail how they were made, when they were made and then simply put in circulation. There is nothing vague or ambiguous in his details and we all owe it to ourselves to read his book to get a first hand account of the mint operations from the man that worked there! The 1930 pennys were made as a progression from 1929 to 1931 and are few in quantity because the government did not require many over that time. its all as simple as that with no mystery or other story.
 In my research  I narrowed down a time span when the myth of door swappers became known in print media and readers of my last three papers on the 1930, printed in various issues the CAB magazine, can read the detail there.
Fred.

[Basil]

Fred,there are still no facts on how it got into circulation,some 'experts' that were in print in the 1960's stated it was nearly 10 years,start of the war,before they turned up and started to create interest which peaked in the 1960's.
Only thing i object to is presenting a argument by denigrating anyone who has a different view,the 1930 penny origins were heavily researched in the 1960's by people that lived and breathed Oz. Coins,to dismiss their views and research 50 + years later is just wrong.
Anyway,my last words on the subject which i find interesting,local Coin Dealer seems to think its me trying to relive my youth so best i move on.

[nealeffendi]

Hi Basil, there was an example in an auction some years back that mentioned that it was found on the Glenelg tram in 1938. So that is pre war and as it wasn't in an exceptional grade it implies several years of active circulation.
There was also a couple that came to the attention of the Melbourne museum in about 1940. 
Gilbert Heyde I think was the chap who owned 7 of them, so he was actively on the hunt to purchase examples. Surely collectors like him would have asked other collectors active in the 1920s and 30s if they had any reliable information about swap a penny. And the coin society members from the late 1920s would (mostly) still be around in 1945 when the hunt really began and would have swapped recollections of their mint tours and if they had been offered the opportunity to swap a penny.
Does anybody have a newspaper article from say pre 1965 that mentions swap a penny? Nothing that I've read from the 1940s or 1950s mentions it so when did the theory first surface?

[serenitystan]

Hi Fred Basil and nealeffendi..The 1930 penny is a eighty nine year Chinese Whisper . Theory-Speculation-Opinions will go on for another 89yrs....FACT stays the same-No record of Minting + Distribution into Circulation...Will always be clouded in Mystery. That's why it's the King of pre-decimals...Cheers..

[Basil]

[quote pid='120466' dateline='1570515160']
Hi Fred Basil and nealeffendi..The 1930 penny is a eighty nine year Chinese Whisper . Theory-Speculation-Opinions will go on for another 89yrs....FACT stays the same-No record of Minting + Distribution into Circulation...Will always be clouded in Mystery. That's why it's the King of pre-decimals...Cheers..
[/quote]

I agree,that's the point i'm making,where is the evidence?,where are the facts?,almost all accounts are opinion pieces that join dots and quote unrelated 'facts' to make a point,this has been going on since i was at School in the 1960's.
This will gain momentum over the coming years as we approach the 100 year anniversary,i know of at least one Book on the 1930 Penny(and the Mint in general) being prepared,Author is looking for some Melb. input as its Sydney centric at the moment.
Anyway its not a subject to cause ill-feeling or ill-will,just a interesting discussion topic.

[Basil]

[quote pid='120465' dateline='1570504688']
Does anybody have a newspaper article from say pre 1965 that mentions swap a penny? Nothing that I've read from the 1940s or 1950s mentions it so when did the theory first surface?
[/quote]

Neal,the swap theory was the main stream one from the 1960/70's,and possibly the late 1950's,why the dozens of articles written on the 1930 Penny at the time are not showing,i can't explain, but i'm sure they will begin to surface over the coming years.
This is a scan that i posted in the other Thread a couple of years ago,i have it noted on my old computer as "Readers Digest article form the 1970's" but i do remember it was reprinted from a Book published in the late 1960's/early 1970's and the original RD article contained an acknowledgement  reference to that fact.

[fred lever]

Basil, yes one should never denigrate any researcher which is why I have gone to great lengths in my articles and papers regarding the 1930 penny, to refer to and quote accurately the research of the many people involved in the last century.
Regarding the question of how the 1930 dated pennies were released: this was thoroughly vetted and put to bed in the 1990's and I am thoroughly perplexed that plain written evidence and proofs are simply ignored.
Three prominent researchers (amongst dozens of others) put the matter to rest and have left written reports for posterity. John Sharples, the then Curator of Numismatics at the Museum of Victoria, William Mullett, the then retired Chief Technical Officer of the Melbourne Mint, and Walter Bloom, the most eminent Australian Numismatist.
1/ Sharples, in his Numismatic Journal paper, JNNA vol3, produced an extensive analysis involving Treasury and Mint records, showing how coins dated 1929, 1930 and 1931 were struck and issued for circulation in 1931.
2/ Mullett, in his book "Australian Coins" provides a forensic account from the Mint Press and workshop records that prove without doubt how and when coins dated 1929, 1930 and 1931 were struck, and issued in for circulation in 1931.
3/ Bloom, in his Numismatic Journal paper, JNNA vol21 details the now whereabouts  and provenance of the pairs of the Specimen 1930 coins provided by the Mint in 1930.
In short, the 1930 dated coins "got out" of the mint in the same way every other coin of any year did. Any "proof" or "specimen" coin was either picked up from, or, officially presented  by the office of the mintmaster, and any 1930 dated circulation coin was in the job batch delivered by the mint for the 1931 order from the Treasury. That is IT.
It is such a pity that Auction houses and dealers, when preparing a valuable 1930 coin for sale or producing a coin catelouge, persist in reproducing the same old touchy feely canards promoting mystery where there is actually no mystery at all! The Mint was asked to produce Specimens and Circulating coin and they did as asked, to the best of their ability.
Anybody that is confused or uncertain should at minimum, carefully read the three Numismatic papers mentioned above, and, to toot my own horn, read my article printed in the December 2017 issue of CAB vol 20-10 where I summarised a lot of the researchers, name by name, in a paragraph "how the 1930 pennies were released". If after reading these papers,  if anyone still did not understand  how the 1930 dated penny coins came about and into circulation, they never will!
This is the last response I will make on the matter of the 1930 penny in this forum.
I also apologise to "Auto" and the moderator of this site for carelessly Hi-Jacking Auto's thread which was about the joy of discovering and collecting Varieties of pennys not rehashing long ago resolved topics.
Fred Lever.