Ever since it became apparent that the election had been hit by massive fraud, I’ve been saying this, but I’m going to say it again: This is for ALL of the Chips.

If Trump were to not continue to be President, then history, looking back, would see his term as a mere speed bump in the course of the collapse of the United States of America. The deep state would come back out of hiding, his gains would be wiped out almost instantly, we’d end up with Obolacare Plus, NAFTA Plus, You-name-it Plus. We’d be facing a Leftist backlash, because they’ve been boiling mad for four years, and now they’d have an unimpeded outlet for that rage.

That’s why President Donald John Trump must prevail. Because without Justice for the Deep State, for the Ruling Class, everything we gained these last four years is transitory.

I’m not just saying this, I put my money where my mouth is last week and went to Washington, thinking (as many others did) that he wasn’t calling us to watch a defeat. Though it certainly did look like a defeat on many levels, we’ll see what happens between now and Wednesday!

Only time and a tell-all memoir will tell how useful our individual actions on that day actually were. But no matter what, those of us lucky enough to be able to go did see history unfold. And those unable to go, well, be assured that we represented you in spirit.

I’ve seen some positive signs. For instance, it seems significant that the overwhelming majority of arrests stemming from the “festivities” of January 6 are Leftist or Democrat agent provocateurs, not MAGA people. Is something actually changing at the FBI?

In general, there’s a lot of odd stuff going on. Something’s brewing!

This will not have been in vain!

A couple of cautions: Let’s be careful, please, to do some checking on the rumors we post.

And let’s remember that we do not know Trump’s battle plan. We’re speculating here.

A Reminder Of The Need for Justice.

Our movement is about replacing a failed and corrupt political establishment with a new government controlled by you, the American People...Our campaign represents a true existential threat, like they’ve never seen before.

Then-Candidate Donald J. Trump

Needs to happen, soon.

Lawyer Appeasement Section

OK now for the fine print.

Please note that our menu has changed, please listen to all of the options.

This is the WQTH Daily Thread. You know the drill. There’s no Political correctness, but civility is a requirement. There are Important Guidelines,  here, with an addendum on 20191110.

We have a new board – called The U Tree – where people can take each other to the woodshed without fear of censorship or moderation.

And remember Wheatie’s Rules:

1. No food fights
2. No running with scissors.
3. If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.
4. The first rule of gun safety: Don’t let the government take your guns.
5. The gun is always loaded.
5a. If you actually want the gun to be loaded, like because you’re checking out a bump in the night, then it’s empty.
6. Never point the gun at anything you’re not willing to destroy.
7. Keep your finger off the trigger until ready to fire.
8. Be sure of your target and what is behind it.
9. Social Justice Warriors, ANTIFA pukes, BLM hypocrites, and other assorted varieties of Marxists can go copulate with themselves, or if insufficiently limber, may substitute a rusty wire brush suitable for cleaning the bore of a twelve or ten gauge.

(Hmm a few extras seem to have crept in.)

Coin of The Day

The Gobrecht Dollar, Redux

I talked about this back, what, six weeks ago? My first post on the new Q Tree.

Here’s a reminder picture of the Gobrecht dollar, in 1836 our first tentative step towards resuming silver dollar coinage which had ended in 1804.

That awesome flying eagle reverse motif had problems, namely that it was hard to get the sucker to strike up properly. In the picture, for instance, you can see high points on the design (like the eagle’s “armpit” area, and the tip of the nearer wing) that just weren’t fully detailed, because the metal didn’t flow completely into the deepest parts of the die. To be sure it took a lot of force (100 tons or so) to strike up a coin the size of a silver dollar in the first place and that no doubt had something to do with it, but ultimately, the design got rejected in favor of a reuse of the “sandwich board” eagle that had been used on our silver coinage since 1807/8.

But that eagle wasn’t completely dead.

Twenty years later, in 1856, the mint was about to embark on an experiment. We had, up until that time, used a coin 29 millimeters (or so) in diameter, and quite thick (compare to a quarter which is 24.3 mm in diameter), made out of fairly pure copper, as our cent. It weighed 168 grains (exactly 0.35 troy ounces, not that you’d measure copper in troy ounces). Collectors now call these cents “large cents” to distinguish them from the considerably smaller pieces we use today.

The government wanted something a bit lighter. These coins were noticeably heavy and really didn’t have a whole lot of purchasing power, even back then.

The Flying Eagle Cent

So it was decided to create what we now call the “small cent.” But what came out of this design process was still a bit odd to today’s eyes. The new coin weighed 72 grains (exactly 0.15 troy ounces, but again no one would weigh this metal in troy ounces). And it was 12 percent nickel (almost exactly 1/8th), 88 percent copper. This was done to bring the intrinsic value up, nickel being more expensive than copper.

It had the same diameter as our current “penny” (a misnomer), but was quite a bit thicker.

Because it had 12 percent nickel, instead of being red, and toning to a brown color, it was a sort of tan color…and stayed that way. You could almost call it “stainless copper.”

(And, note, that our current “nickel” and the surface layers of our dime and quarter, are 25 percent nickel, 75 percent copper. Even though they are mostly copper, there’s no copper color to them at all!)

What design appeared on the 1856 patterns, and then the full production run of 1857 and 1858?

Why, that same eagle from the Gobrecht Dollar, of course.

As you can see, using a smaller coin didn’t help. Notice the eagle’s breast is flat. The wingtips, at least look good.

This peculiar copper nickel alloy earned this coin the nickname “nick,” but it did prove popular as it was much more convenient than those old large cents. So it looked like, on the whole, the experiment would be a success. Other countries had tried making nickel coinage, but usually it was pure nickel, and it was finicky to work with at the time, the biggest problem being to measure the heat of the coins when they were being annealed. (We had no thermometers, so the workers had to judge by the color the coin was glowing. And on a cloudy day, or late in the day, the light would be different enough to throw them off.) Poorly annealed planchets wore down the dies.

But we apparently had found an alloy that was tough, but workable.

(Incidentally the 1856 Flying Eagle cent pattern is a rarity, only 2000 were made, and they are nearly as expensive as Gobrecht dollars.)

The Indian Head Cent

Nevertheless, in 1859 we went to a new design, still on those copper-nickel thick planchets with the tan color.

Interestingly, this was the year Abraham Lincoln turned 50; no one at the time thought he was important enough to commemorate by changing the design of the cent, but that would change by the time he turned 100. Or 150. Or 200. But it’s funny that a major design change did occur for his 50th year just to complete the pattern!

The Indian Head cent would last until 1909. But not quite like this.

The very next year saw a change to the reverse, with the laurel wreath replaced with oak leaves and a shield added.

This reverse would stay with the Indian Head cent until it ended. But we’re still not done.

In mid-1864 it was decided to debase the coin just a bit. The nickel was removed from the alloy, and some tin was put in instead to make it bronze, rather than copper. The overall weight was reduced to 48 grains, exactly a tenth of a troy ounce. This, finally, was the “cent” we grew up with.

The new alloy, of course, would turn from red to brown over time, as people handled it. Interestingly, the better struck the coin, the more likely it was to turn brown (this had been true of the large cents as well).

And now we have coins where, when they are graded, there is a distinction made between red, red-brown, and brown colors (and red coins typically command a premium). The third party grading companies guarantee their numeric grade, but since their holders aren’t air tight, they will not guarantee that a coin they graded as “MS 60 RD” (Mint state 60, Red) will actually stay “red”.

I personally prefer them in red-brown–the price is cheaper (I won’t lose as much if the coin does tone on me) and it’s still not completely brown.

On these coins, the tips of the feathers are often poorly struck. Nevertheless we stuck with the design until mid 1909, and then it was time to commemorate Abraham Lincoln’s 100th birthday, which was probably a bitter pill to swallow for a lot of old vets from the South who remembered the Civil War.

There was one more minor change in 1864. After switching to bronze, it was decided to add a small L to the design, it was the initial of James Longacre, the designer. 1864 L cents as they are known, are much more expensive than 1864 “no L” cents, but of course the L was retained from that point forward, so if you want a cent with the L on it and don’t care what year it is, that’s easy. Another tough one to find and pay for is an 1877, for some reason.

In 1908 and 1908 only, some of these were made in San Francisco and there is an S mintmark on the reverse. Those are also considerably more expensive than the non S ones. (Any 1909 cent with an S on it is expensive than without…and there were three of them: the Indian Head cent, the Lincoln Cent with VDB initials [a rarity even non-collectors have often heard about], and the Lincoln Cent without the VDB initials.)

So there you have a history of the Indian Head cent. My thanks to Wolf for suggesting the topic.

Standard disclaimer: I never show pictures of my coins, and in many cases don’t own anything remotely resembling the coins in these pictures. Any prospective thieves should know I also collect other heavy metals–anything with a heavier nucleus would be unstable–and keep those a lot closer to me than the coins.

Obligatory PSA

I think Wolf would fire me if I were to forget this.

Remember Hong Kong!!! And remember the tens of millions who died under the “Great Helmsman” Chairman Mao.

中国是个混蛋 !!!
Zhōngguò shì gè hùndàn !!!
China is asshoe !!!

For my money the Great Helmsman is Hikaru Sulu (even if the actor is a dingbat).