1961 Doubled Die Obverse DDO-010

Description

Medium spread concentrated on the RTY of LIBERTY, the date, and TRUST characterizes DDO-010 on the 1961 Franklin Half Dollar, with light spread extending to IN GOD WE. The selective doubling pattern — strongest on the final three letters of LIBERTY rather than uniformly across all letters — reveals the specific geometry of hub misalignment that created this die, where displacement was most pronounced in the region furthest from the pivot point of rotation. Die stage documentation under UVC-164 and DMR-012 records three states: Stage A at Early Die State (unconfirmed), Stage B with both obverse and reverse confirmed at Mid-Die State, and Stage C at Late Die State (unconfirmed). The 1961 date is the second-to-last year of the Franklin Half Dollar series, which ran from 1948 through 1963 before being replaced by the Kennedy design. With approximately 8.3 million business strikes and 3.2 million proofs produced in 1961, surviving examples of DDO-010 likely exist in meaningful numbers, though awareness of this specific variety determines how many have been correctly attributed. Cataloged by VarietyVista, the focused spread on RTY provides a quick screening diagnostic — collectors can rapidly check these three letters before committing to the fuller examination needed to confirm the date and TRUST doubling.

Die Markers

• UVC-164
• DMR-012
• Stage A:
• EDS (unconfirmed)
• Stage B:
• Obverse and Reverse are MDS
• Stage C:
• LDS (unconfirmed)

Attribution History

• Discovered by Charles Bondurant
• Expert attribution by VarietyVista

External References