CU-1C-1920S-04 Cud

Description

Cataloged as CU-1C-1920S-04 in the Cuds on Coins registry, this fourth documented cud on the 1920 (S) Lincoln Wheat Cent reflects the post-World War I transition at the San Francisco Mint. With wartime urgency fading but circulating coinage still in heavy demand as the economy shifted to peacetime footing, die usage patterns continued to push dies toward their structural limits. The die rim — essentially a thin wall of hardened steel forming the coin's raised border — absorbs tremendous stress with each strike, and after hundreds of thousands of impressions, fatigue cracks develop that can propagate until a section separates entirely. That separation produces a cud: the missing die segment leaves a cavity that fills with planchet metal, creating a raised featureless blob on the finished coin. Four cuds documented for the 1920-S date indicate multiple dies failed at the rim during this production run, each one a separate die and fracture event. The Cuds on Coins numbering system assigns sequential suffixes as varieties are reported, meaning the "-04" designation records the order of documentation rather than any production sequence.

Attribution History

• Discovered by Marvin L
• CU-1C-1920S-04
• Expert attribution by Cuds on Coins

External References