CU-1C-2009-01 Cud

Description

Commemorating the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth, the 2009 Lincoln Bicentennial series featured four special reverse designs celebrating key chapters in Lincoln's life — and this first cataloged cud appears on the Professional Life reverse depicting Lincoln standing before the Illinois State Capitol in Springfield. A cud forms when a section of the die rim fractures and separates completely, leaving a cavity that fills with metal during striking to produce a raised featureless mass along the rim. The Professional Life design, one of the four 2009 reverses alongside Birth and Early Childhood, Formative Years, and Presidency, showcases Lincoln's career as a lawyer and legislator before his election to the presidency. Cataloged by Cuds on Coins, CU-1C-2009-01 documents die rim failure on a coin that was itself transitional — the four Bicentennial reverses served as a bridge between the long-running Memorial reverse that ended in 2008 and the Shield reverse that debuted in 2010. Die rim fractures on modern copper-plated zinc cents result from the cumulative stress of high-speed production, where dies may strike hundreds of thousands of coins before retirement.

Attribution History

• Discovered by Chuck Newman
• CU-1C-2009-01
• Expert attribution by Cuds on Coins

External References