Rare Penny Sells For $1.7 Million

by Deidre Woollard (RSS feed)
Sep 23rd 2010 at 6:01PM

When is a penny worth $1.7 million? The cent shown at right is no average coin, it's a one-of-a-kind Lincoln cent, mistakenly struck in 1943 at the Denver Mint in bronze rather than the zinc-coated steel used that year to conserve copper for World War II. It has been sold by Legend Numismatics of Lincroft, New Jersey for $1.7 million to an unnamed Southwestern business executive. The coin's anonymous former owner made arrangements for the entire sale proceeds to go to a charitable organization.

"This is the world's most valuable penny. It's the only known example of a 1943-dated Lincoln cent incorrectly struck in a copper alloy at the Denver Mint. Zinc-coated steel was being used for pennies in 1943 to conserve copper for other uses during World War II, and this one was mistakenly struck on a bronze coin disc left over from 1942. It took four years of aggressive negotiations with the coin's owner until he agreed to sell it," said rare coin dealer Laura Sperber, President of Legend Numismatics of Lincroft, New Jersey who obtained the unique penny for the unnamed collector.

The new owner has been a coin collector since he was a teenager. When he was a kid he thought he had found a 1943 copper penny in circulation but it was not authentic. He is "the only person to ever assemble a complete set of genuine 1943 bronze cents, one each from the Philadelphia, Denver and San Francisco Mints, and he plans to display them," said Sperber.

Most 1943 pennies are steel-gray in color and not worth much more than face value but less than 20 pennies were accidentally struck in bronze that year at the Philadelphia and San Francisco Mints, and this is the only known example from the Denver Mint according to Don Willis, President of Professional Coin Grading Service of Santa Ana, California, the rare coin certification company whose experts authenticated the unique 1943 Denver bronze cent.

The anonymous penny-mad collector also paid $250,000 for a 1944-dated Philadelphia Mint cent mistakenly struck on a zinc-coated steel coin blank intended only for 1943 pennies, and paid $50,000 for an experimental 1942 cent composed mostly of tin. The collector's coins will be publicly displayed at a major rare coin convention in Tampa, Florida, January 6 - 8, 2011.

Tags: coin collecting, coins, numismatics, rare coin, rare penny

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Reader Comments (Page 2 of 2)

Tom Sep 25th 2010 2:49PM

Richard: You are so funny!
And...., I used to have the fist-sized diamond from which the Hope Diamond was cut.

I think my kid mixed it with the glass bobbles in the fish pond at a local park. The pond was filled in years ago and now sits under a Super Walmart store.
Maybe your house trailer blew into the same pond.

If we can get MILKM205 to front us the money, we could buy the Walmart, tear it down, and excavate the pond.
Waddaya think?

Richard Sep 25th 2010 3:09PM

Milk,
Good idea, but my trailer was totaled for scrap 46 years ago!

Tom,
Get a life.

Al Martin Sep 25th 2010 4:09PM

My dad has the same penny and he found it while he was working at Bank of America in 1963 or around that time. He was in the papers all over and people were calling him from around the world offering him money back then. The offers were around 10,000 dollars then. We still have it in a blue box thing, and never really think about it. I could arrange a meeting if someone is willing to pay that much for it. I also have all the articles that were printed in the San Francisco Examiner and Chronicle from when he found it. His penny was inspected back then and was discovered to be authentic.

bob white Sep 25th 2010 6:55PM

MISTAKE MY AZZ........YEA SOMEONE ON THE INSIDE MADE HIMSELF A FEW KNOWING WHAT THEY WOULD BE WORTH...SAME THING HAPPENED WITH OTHER COINS TOO....IT WOULD HAVE TO BE SOMEONE WAY UP TO PULL IT OFF TOO...

Gulliver Sep 26th 2010 12:25AM

I guess it is what it is... I have a 264 year old King James Bible that has been passed down forever. I cant even get anyones interest. Hope the guy does well. Thanks. -Richard

dxxy4u Sep 26th 2010 12:46AM

This is pure BS. I'm 68 years old, and that penny was being looked for then. Now some 60 odd years it turns up. It it was the REAL thing it would sell ten times that much. Only ONE were struck, and it sell for a measly 1.7 mil, when that was a penny collectors dream, finding that one and only 1943 copper penny. This whole story is BS.

mhwyman7 Sep 26th 2010 2:41AM

Penny wise Dollar foolish!

Diana Schrieber Sep 26th 2010 5:54AM

It seems to me that the original owner must have needed a tax write off. So he gave the money to a charity. I wish I was making so much money that I needed a write off B/4 the end of the year. There seems to be alot of money somewhere in this country.

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