Wheat Pennies

When I was younger, I spent a lot of time on eBay looking at auctions for coins. What interested me particularly were the massive hoards of coins that people had bought at estate sales. Over the years people had accumulated thousands and thousands of coins, sometimes even millions, and had them lying around the house when they passed away. These auctions promised to scoop out a certain amount of coins without searching them and mail them to you. The fun part of this was that you never knew what you might find because the coins were from all different years and in different conditions. The coins that interested me the most were the wheat pennies.

Wheat pennies are the standard one-cent U.S. coins that were produced from 1909 until 1958. They feature the familiar portrait of Abraham Lincoln on the obverse and large print flanked by strands of wheat on the reverse. Prior to 1909, the one-cent coin was the Indian Head penny, which featured an idealized Indian Chief on the obverse. Up until this time, no specific person had there portrait engraved on coinage for fear of emulating monarchical practices. Instead, manifestations of Liberty, including the Indian Head, were featured on the obverse. In 1909, President Theodore Roosevelt, seeking to reinvigorate American coinage design, decided to feature Lincoln on the penny in order to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his birth. This started a tradition of featuring deceased presidents on our coinage.

The fun thing about wheat pennies is that you can still find them in circulation or by searching through rolls of pennies at the bank. Although they are relatively rare, it's not impossible to encounter a few in your everyday purchases. However, certain wheat pennies are rarer than others and are worth more too. Here are a few of the rarest and most interesting:

1. 1909-S-V.D.B

The 1909-S-V.D.B. was the first set of wheat pennies minted (among a set of 484,000). They feature an S on the obverse below the year (indicating that the coin was minted in San Francisco) and the initials V.D.B on the bottom of the reverse. The initials stand for Victor David Brenner, the name of the designer of the wheat penny. He included his initials on the reverse of the original wheat pennies in very small print. However, it was noticeable enough to cause an uproar with the American public and the Mint officials who promptly removed the initials. It's value ranges from $750 to $2100+ depending on the condition that it is in.



2. 1955 Double Die

The 1955 Double Die is one of the most interesting wheat pennies because of the nature of its error. Coins are minted using coin dies which are created by striking the die with a working hub to embed the image. One of the dies in 1955 was misaligned when it was struck for the second time by the working hub, creating the second shifted image on the coin. Around 40,000 pennies were created from this single die, all during one night shift at the mint in Philadelphia.
 


3. 1943 Steel Wheat Penny

In 1943, during the middle of World War II, the United States government decided to use the Mint's allocated coin copper for ammunition and other military equipment. Thus, instead of producing copper pennies that year, the Mint decided to produce steel pennies. These steel pennies featured the exact same design as other wheat pennies except they were made out of a different material. While interesting and a piece of history, these pennies are not particularly rare. However, the pennies that are rare from this year are the 1943 copper pennies that were made by mistake before the Mint switched over to steel. These are extremely rare and have sold for upwards of $100,000!


Wheat pennies are very fun to collect and are a cheap and inexpensive way to get started coin collecting and to own a piece of American history. Next time you're at the cash register, look through your change or pick up a roll of pennies at the bank and see if you can find any!