Dateless Buffalo Nickels
The many dateless Buffalo Nickels are the result of a poor design of the coin. The date was placed on the raised portion of the shoulder of the Indian. Because this placement is on an exposed part of the coin, the date simply got worn off from constant handling during circulation.
The first series of buffalo nickels also had this problem but it was the word “five cents” that wore off. The source of this problem was that the value was placed on a raised area just below the bison on the tail side of the coin. This was seen and corrected within the first year of its minting by the chief engraver Charles E. Barber. But there was an oversight and the date was not corrected to prevent the same problematic wear.
The dateless nickels were mostly made before 1926. The minting of the buffalo nickel began in 1913 and ended in 1938. Most of these coins were removed from circulation in the 1950’s and 1960’s. It is said that 1 in 25,000 nickels in circulation today is still a buffalo nickel.
For coin collecting purposes, the dateless buffalo coin is not worth more than 5 to 20 cents, because of the condition of the coins. If you own a dateless nickel, an experiment can be done to verify if what you have is an authentic dateless buffalo coin. By placing a drop of ferric chloride or other weak acid on the dated area, the date may be revealed. In many coin collecting stores it goes by the trade name of “Nic-a-Date”. After this is used, most coin collectors consider the coin valueless because of the modification that was done to the coin.
But if you own dateless Buffalo Nickels, the choice is yours. The difference between 5 cents and no cents is not enough to worry about.
Comments (0)
