UtahRich:
Me thinks that Monte is going to just call it a War Nickel and leave it at that.
Monte's thoughts:
It's just another mixed-metal Five Cent piece, and unless a coin had ~90% of one primary metal, then it is simply a 'mixed-metal' coin.
The common 5¢ piece had been called a "Half-Dime" because it was half-the-value of a 10¢ piece or Dime. That was, at first, the Half-Dime which was also called a Five-Cent piece. It started out with .8924% silver, but we casually call it a "silver Half-Dime" but the fact is, it is just a 'Half-Dime' in value. We add the word 'silver' to make a coin find sound better, especially if we're referring to finding a Roosevelt Dime. It's just a 'Dime' or 10¢ piece, but we are looking for, and hoping to find, a 1964 or earlier mintage that would be a 'silver' Dime.
Our Larger Cents and following Small Cents were just a 'One Cent' or 1¢ coin, even though they are made mainly of Copper. Even a 95% copper Penny was just a Penny or One Cent coin .... until we got those blasted 'modern', junk-metal Pennies made of Zinc that have a very thin copper wash to coat them. Because they are predominantly made of Zinc, we call the Zinc Cents. The 1943 Penny was made of steel and had a thin zinc metal coat, but we call them what they are, an that's a Steen Cent.
In both of those examples, we referred to those denominations by their primary metal alloy. That makes sense. Now, a coin made or 75% of one metal falls short of the ~90% 'limit' I consider to be predominant, so we don't use that in the reference to a coin, such as a 'copper 5-Cent Piece. It's a mix of 75% Copper and 25% nickel. The 'war-era' 5¢ coins, that we unjustly call a 'nickel' had a much lower percentage of silver use, at only 35%, so there's no real basis to consider them a true "Silver Coin" like the ~90% silver we saw use in Half-Dimes, Dimes, Quarters, Halves and Dollars.
We do error with other denominations as well. Consider the two different 3¢ coins we had. There were really three composition variations of them. The smaller-size 3¢ from1851–53 was 75% Ag
(silver) and 25% Cu, so it fell below the ~90% requirement to be a 'true' "silver Three-Cent" piece. But the mintage from 1854–73 were ~90% Ag
(silver) and 10% Cu so those truly qualify as being a 'silver' coin.
But the larger-size 3¢ piece, mintage from 1865 to 1889, the composition was 75% Cu and 25% Ni. So we maybe should be calling them a 'copper 3¢ piece' since 75% of their alloy was copper. I mean, we errantly call the 1851-1853 3¢ piece a 'silver' coin and it is also only 75% primary make-up of silver. So, probably the right move would be to call ALL of the larger-size 5¢ pieces a 'copper' coin and not a 'nickel' or 'silver' coin as those alloys were a minor part of their alloy make-up.
So, that said, I'm glad you found one of the better quality Five Cent pieces, with a good mix of Copper and Silver
(in that order
) which comprise a more durable mix than one of Copper and Nickel which is a lesser-quality or durable mix.
Here's a consideration, and I hope the mint folks are coming up with some better ideas.
"
In December 2014, the Mint released its next Biennial report in response to the CMOCA. In it, the Mint declared that plated zinc products did not hold up to steam/wear tests and were rejected for U.S. coins other than the penny. Materials considered "feasible" for the 5-cent coin were nickel-plated steel, multi-ply-plated steel, and potentially another copper/nickel alloy, this time with ~77% copper, ~20% nickel, and ~3% manganese. Further testing was recommended to explore even less expensive alloys that would not require changes to vending machines (as the steel-based materials would require)."
I sure hope they don't get a lot of help from our Canadian friends up north. Maybe phase out the 1¢ coins and start minting some $1 and $2 coins of decent-quality metal alloy and dump the paper currency while they are figuring out a good metal for the 5¢ piece.
Monte
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