I had recently come into a bunch of Indian Head Pennies, and with careful searching I found one that really stood out. It is a 1901 in VG condition, but the unique thing about this coin is that it has a ribbed edge just like a dime, and you can tell that it was struck this way, and not done by hand. I was wondering if anyone out there could tell me what I have, I've been unable to find another one like it online anywhere. I have included some pictures so you can see for yourself.
Post mint, there were a number of these done at one of the older ANA convention, I forget who did them
Thinking back, didn't they have machines at those events that could do this? Sort of making a token out of a coin like the coin rolling machines do for elongateds?
Yes they were made deliberately by a reeding machine.. if that what it was called. You can even see the reed has a slight tilt.. not a perfect vertical alignment.
Exonumia.. here is an example on a IHC. Man made reeds not to be attributed to normal Cent Milling such as the OP Cent in question.
They did do this as a novelty item. They also did them to large cents if I remember and called them pie cutters.
There were some reeded edge IHC patterns, but their edge look quite different. Since the reeding of the patterns was cut into the collar, the reeds extend beyond the normal diameter of an IHC. To show the difference, I have quickly cobbled together a pattern coin against the OP's coin. The "reeded" edge on the 1901 is angled--something you don't see on US mint products. They are also uneven, which suggests handwork was involved--certainly not struck that way.
A few bucks as exonumia. No collector of IHC wants this in their collection, but there are collectors of unusual exonumia would might pay $5 for it since it was most likely done long ago. If you cannot find one of these collectors, then its worth almost nothing since its a PMD coin.
