Enid Coin Club

10/12/2026

In this Knowledge Center article, we explore the Oregon Trail Memorial Half Dollar, born from one man's lifelong mission to preserve the memory of the pioneers who crossed the trail before history forgot them.

We have selected articles showcasing 250 years of American numismatic
history. Read this article and many more here: https://bit.ly/4y0ospg

10/12/2026

Today's Feature: 1972 D Eisenhower Dollar Error Capped Die - ANA 1979.149.72 | Object: # 197 🇺🇸

Sometimes a mistake at the Mint doesn’t produce just one error—it produces a whole sequence of them. A die cap begins when a struck coin fails to eject and instead sticks to one of the dies. As the press continues operating, that trapped coin strikes the planchets that follow. With each blow, the struck coin spreads and stretches around the die, eventually taking on a bottle-cap or thimble-like shape. The resulting coins can show increasingly distorted, weak, or brockage-like impressions, preserving different stages of the same mechanical failure.

By the 1970s, errors like this were developing a collecting culture of their own. Organizations including the Numismatic Error Collectors of America (NECA) and Collectors of Numismatic Errors (CONE) connected specialists through publications such as Errorscope and The Errorgram, while Error Trends Coin Magazine helped document and popularize unusual Mint mistakes. Dealers such as John Devine—better known as “Lonesome John”—built national businesses around errors. What had once been dismissed simply as defective money was becoming a recognized numismatic specialty. Collectors weren’t just finding mistakes anymore; they were learning to reconstruct how the Mint made them.

💬 Put your error-detective skills to work: what do you think happened at the press to create this coin?

Explore our (R)evolution in Currency features online today: https://www.money.org/money-museum/america250/

10/07/2026

The Common Cents Act already targets the penny, but lawmakers now want the Treasury Department to find cheaper ways to produce the nickel coin.

10/07/2026

10/07/2026

Today's Feature: 1969 $500 Federal Reserve Note, Series 1934A - ANA 2023.3.23 | Object: # 194 🇺🇸

In 1969, America’s big bills reached the end of the line. The $500, $1,000, $5,000, and $10,000 Federal Reserve notes had last been printed in 1945, but existing supplies continued to be issued for another 24 years. By then, checks and improved bank-transfer systems had largely replaced the transactions for which high-denomination currency was once useful. On July 14, 1969, the Treasury and Federal Reserve announced that denominations above $100 would no longer be issued.

This Series 1928A $500 Federal Reserve Note, bearing the signatures of Treasurer Walter O. Woods and Treasury Secretary Andrew W. Mellon, represents the kind of large-denomination currency that was disappearing. After 1969, high-denomination notes returned to Federal Reserve Banks were withdrawn from circulation rather than reissued, steadily reducing the number available to collectors. They were never demonetized, however. This not remains legal tender for $500 today—but its scarcity, age, condition, and collector demand give it a value of more than 10 times its face.

💬 This $500 bill is worth more than ten times face to collectors. What note have you owned that dramatically outgrew its denomination?

Explore our (R)evolution in Currency features online today: https://www.money.org/money-museum/america250/

10/07/2026

Today's Feature: 1967 Kennedy Half Dollar - ANA 1972.27.194 | Object: # 192 🇺🇸

By 1967, silver was disappearing from American pocket change—but not all at once. Dimes and quarters had switched to copper-nickel clad construction in 1965, while the Kennedy half dollar retained 40% silver. Its construction was itself a compromise: a silver-copper core was sandwiched between outer layers containing 80% silver, allowing the half dollar to retain some precious metal while using substantially less than its 90% predecessor.

At the same time, the government was recovering the old silver coins still circulating alongside their replacements. The Mint’s 1968 annual report recorded millions of dollars in silver quarters and dimes being separated form clad coins, withdrawn from circulation, and melted. Thus Americans in 1967 could carry three generations of metallic money at once: old 90% silver coins, new copper-nickel clad coins, and 40% silver Kennedy halves like this one. The transition from silver happened coin by coin!

💬 Collectors have plenty of tricks for spotting silver. Without checking the date, how would you distinguish this 40% silver half from a later clad Kennedy?

Explore our (R)evolution in Currency features online today: https://www.money.org/money-museum/america250/

09/27/2026