2017-03-22 Wed

The final doubled die gold overdate in U.S. coinage is the 1909/8 Saint-Gaudens $20 and is created when hubs of two different dates were used to create the main die. Only two main double die varieties of this coin are known. One was discovered in 2017 and the second one is an overdate variety. The second variety is not an overdate created when different date punches were stamped over the other. A die of one date was carried over into the New Year or the date would be re-punched to the New Year’s date. These coins are highly prized today.

The obverse die, dated 1908 was updated to use it after 31st December. The process for this update was different from the original coin. The 1908 die was hubbed for a second time with a 1909 hub due to which the 8 is visible below the second 9. This 1909/8 variety was considered rare initially, but later a European hoard with more number of overdate coins was found. Experts state that 80,000 examples of the overdate could exist. One of it, graded About Uncirculated 58 is offered by Stack’s Bowers Galleries’ Baltimore auctions on 31st March.