With a circulation mintage of 1,580,884,000, small and large date varieties, and over 100 unique Repunched Mint Marks (RPMs) cataloged by the Combine Organization of Numismatic Error Collectors (CONECA), the 1960 D Lincoln cent is in a class of its own (Bowers, 2008, Wiles, 2016). Among the large number of RPMs for the date, the 1960D RPM 1 and the 1960D RPM 100 standout as colossal varieties for Lincoln cent collectors. The 1960D RPM 1 is arguably the King of RPMs for the Memorial cent sub-series. Further, a breathtaking chimera-type variety can be found on the 1960D RPM 100. The variety has a spectacular doubled die showing a small date hubbed over a large date, which by itself would attract considerable attention from variety collectors. Making the variety exponentially desirable, the doubled die is also combined with a RPM punched to the north with a significant spread.
1960 was indeed a wonderful year for variety enthusiasts. As a result, I am excited whenever a 1960D Lincoln cent is put in front of me.

Tangent
I am an avid roll searcher. For those of you not familiar with the term – I regularly pick up boxes of rolled cents from my local banks and I look through them for varieties and errors. I actually have an efficient system where I pick up rolls from one bank and drop off my searched cents at another bank to avoid cross-contamination. There is nothing worse than the feeling that you are searching the same group of cents you have already searched. So, protective measures are needed.

Expectations
I have noticed that I have an expectation regarding 1960D cents. I have an assumption (an anticipation if you will) that each 1960D cent I find will be a variety. It’s kind of funny and it may allude to my optimistic personality. Even though the RPM listings by CONECA number in the triple digits, the odds and statistics directly conflict with my cognitive association with the date.

Let’s do some numbers
I mean, think about it - 1,580,884,000 1960D cents were minted for circulation. Charles Daughtrey (2013) once noted that a working die that lasts to a Late Die State (LDS) can produce up to 650,000 cents. Not all working dies will make it that long before begin retired. Therefore, taking a conservative estimate of 400,000 cents per die would yield 3,952 possible obverse working dies. With 113 RPM listings in CONECA’s database, that leaves a 2.8% chance that any given 1960D cent will be from one of those cataloged dies. That means less than three out of every 100 1960D cents I look at has the potential of being a listed die variety.

Regardless of this logic, I still have excitement and expectations when I come across a 1960D cent. Are these feelings unfounded? Does anyone else have similar responses to seeing that date and mint mark combination?

David Miller

References
Bowers, Q. D., (2008). A guide book of lincoln cents. Whitman Publishing, LLC. Atlanta GA.
Daughtrey, C. (2013). Die states. Retrieved from http://www.lincolncentforum.com/foru...light=Die+life
Wiles, J. (2016). The Lincoln cent rpm book vol 2: 1959-1989. Retrieved from: http://varietyvista.com/02b%20LC%20R...D%20(1-60).htm