1891-P VAM-8

Description

Cataloged as 8 III28 · C3a with plate photo 190, this 1891 Philadelphia Mint Morgan Dollar carries the designation "Doubled Obverse" and was discovered by Herb Zepke in July 1998. The variety exhibits slight doubling across multiple facial features of George T. Morgan's Liberty Head portrait — the nose, lips, chin, and lower front of the eyelid all show secondary impressions from a shifted hub contact during die preparation. The doubling also extends to the left side of the lower cotton leaf in Liberty's wreath, demonstrating that the hub displacement affected design elements beyond the central portrait. Obverse die class III28 specifically designates a doubled obverse die, with the "28" subclass marking the characteristic within the VAM classification framework. The breadth of affected elements — spanning from the eye down through the chin and laterally to the cotton leaf — maps a hub shift that influenced a wide zone of the obverse die face, though the "slightly doubled" qualifier indicates the displacement was modest in magnitude. Reverse C3a is normal, confining the variety's diagnostic interest to the obverse. Philadelphia Mint, 90% silver at 26.73 grams. The 1891 Morgan Dollar was struck during the series' later years at Philadelphia, before the Pittman Act melting of 1918 would destroy millions of surviving silver dollars from this era.

External References