1968 Lincoln Cent Date Guide

A return to mintmarks and proof sets shows that the Mint was over their problematic period of catching up to a coinage shortage and changing metallic content of most of the circulating coins. Mintage returned to pre-1965 levels with one major change — the San Francisco Mint's distinguishable S mint mark returned not only to business strike cents for the first time since 1955, but to proof coinage as well.

Special collector sets had been minted in San Francisco without mint marks since 1965, and with the lifting of the mint mark ban in 1967, the Mint decided to once again use the familiar mint mark of the west coast mint. This created the first ever U.S. issued proof coins bearing mint marks.

Doubled dies and repunched mint marks are sparsely distributed this year, although some of the known examples are very nice. This means collectors are far less likely to find die varieties on 1968 cents, but the ones they do find are usually very nice. Most sought after is a strong class 5 pivoted hub doubled die reverse found on some 1968-D cents.

One important thing to be very mindful of when searching through 1968 cents is that machine doubling is extremely common on this year's cents. Very deep devices on the coins could be one of the causes.

However, a design change in 1969 did not stop the onslaught of machine doubled coins, so deep devices cannot be the only reason. It is believed that overall quality control was lacking during this era, which would answer for many of the machine doubling problems exhibited on cents from 1968 through 1971.

Another detrimental feature of 1968 cents is the fact that the master design used for all 1968 cents is the same one that had been used for decades on the Lincoln cent and it was definitely showing its age. The details on the bust had become mushy and the motto merges with the rim on typically struck cents. This is a very common occurrence that holds most of the coins to a low GEM status at best.A return to mint marks and proof sets shows that the Mint was over their problematic period of catching up to a coinage shortage and changing metallic content of most of the circulating coins.

Mintage returned to pre-1965 levels with one major change — the San Francisco Mint's distinguishable S mint mark returned not only to business strike cents for the first time since 1955, but to proof coinage as well. Special collector sets had been minted in San Francisco without mint marks since 1965, and with the lifting of the mint mark ban in 1967, the Mint decided to once again use the familiar mint mark of the west coast mint. This created the first ever U.S. issued proof coins bearing mintmarks.

Doubled dies and repunched mint marks are sparsely distributed this year, although some of the known examples are very nice. This means collectors are far less likely to find die varieties on 1968 cents, but the ones they do find are usually very nice. Most sought after is a strong class 5 pivoted hub doubled die reverse found on some 1968-D cents.

One important thing to be very mindful of when searching through 1968 cents is that machine doubling is extremely common on this year's cents. Very deep devices on the coins could be one of the causes. However, a design change in 1969 did not stop the onslaught of machine doubled coins, so deep devices cannot be the only reason. It is believed that overall quality control was lacking during this era, which would answer for many of the machine doubling problems exhibited on cents from 1968 through 1971.

Another detrimental feature of 1968 cents is the fact that the master design used for all 1968 cents is the same one that had been used for decades on the Lincoln cent and it was definitely showing its age. The details on the bust had become mushy and the motto merges with the rim on typically struck cents. This is a very common occurrence that holds most of the coins to a low GEM status at best.