Thank you for dropping by! This site is dedicated to providing information about Buffalo nickel varieties. It focuses on the “Lesser Known” varieties included in PCGS’s Buffalo Nickels Complete Varieties Set. Some background pages are accessible from the menu bar at the top of the page. They provide information about how Buffalo nickel varieties are created and some suggestions about how to search for them on the Web. The heart of the site is set up as a blog so that it is easy to update and provides an interactive format for others to contribute. My posts to the blog will use the coins in my PCGS Registry set and others to provide images and descriptions of each individual variety as time allows.

In each post of a variety, there will be an image of both the full obverse and full reverse of the coin. Next there will be an image of the area of the variety’s primary feature or features and typically the same image augmented by highlighting the feature. By comparing the two images it should be easier to see the specifics of this particular variety.

For some varieties, “clue” images and comments will come after these variety images. The clue images include features of the specific variety coin that seem to co-occur with the variety but are not part of the variety per se. For example, since  there is a die crack from the Buffalo’s tail to the rim on many examples of the 1918 Double Die Reverse (DDR), then the presence of a die crack in that location is a clue that the coin might be the DDR. It is a clue because it is not part of the variety – it was not made a feature of the die by a mint employee. Likely there are examples of the variety that exist without the clue or coins with the clue but that are not the variety. This is the case for the 1918 DDR. The presence of the clue does not guarantee the coin is the indicated variety, just as its absence does not guarantee it is not. The presence of the clue just increases the probability the coin is of the sought variety.

I hope this concrete and visual information about each variety will encourage you to seek out the varieties, and will make it easier for you to find the ones you want.

From time to time I also will make a more typical blog post – random comments on my coin related activities. Perhaps I found a new variety. Or I felt like describing a special coin. Or I just heard back from PCGS. These comments will run the gamut, but I will try not to let them get to far off the wall.

You also are invited to post. By registering you can Comment on any post. Obviously, keep your comments on topic. It would be very helpful if you could examine your varieties and Comment if your varieties have the same or different features and clues as I describe. Whether the same or different, this would allow us to grow the body of information.

If you would like to start a new post, perhaps some aspects of a coin you recently found, please send me an email (coins@coolkarma.com) and I’ll set you up appropriately. Tell us about what you have!

This site will always be a work in progress and with your help will always be getting better. In talking with some of you I already have some more ideas to implement. I greatly appreciate your thoughts and ideas and will attempt to incorporate them into the format and content of the site in a way that allows you to contribute most easily and valuably.  Enjoy!