In looking at Lincoln cents from the past 20 years, I can clearly see hair on Lincoln's jaw but in MS65 photos of early Lincoln cents (1909-1950), I see no hair. Has the facial hair of Lincoln become stronger in recent years? Otherwise I don't understand how a new penny I get in change at the store can have better features than an MS65 penny I see from the early 1900's.

Not only the beard, but the hair on his head became spaghettized.

may be cause they were older but ur rite its not just the lincoln cents i see them on my dimes an quarters also maybe wear from there use. maybe.

The individual dies used are not the same ones they used earlier. I don't know how many die sets the mint goes through each year, but I'd bet it's a bunch. Each new die is going to have tiny differences, and over the years many small changes have been made to the portrait.

abe's all about the grecian formula lately ...

How about his tie?

What about the tie?

how come the tie is facein left and not right? oh and it looks croocked i think.

I was bored in my lab one day and took it at a decent magnification. It is facing that direction because of the optics of the microscope. I was also too lazy to flip the picture in an image editor.

This isn't a 65, it's graded as 63. How does this detail compare?

The old Lincolns still look better than todays. Just something about them looks off.

drwstr123 - the 1922-D coin looks like the new pennies I see. I guess the MS65 coins I have seen are not true MS65s. Thanks for placing this photo for me to see.

mjc

Another thing mjc is the state of the die. I've seen some pretty weak strikes in the mid MS grades. The weaker strike would lead to less detail.

So it's hard to say why the MS65's you've seen don't look like others.

Just curious, what company slabs are you seeing these MS65's in? That may make a big difference as well.

I believe I read somewhere that the obverse master hub has changed a few times since 1909, therefore dies derived from these different hubs will not look the same.