Cheesie Mack

1909 Pennies (The stuff on this webpage was mentioned on page 198 in my book.)

A 1909 penny is really important in the Cheesie Mack Is Not a Genius or Anything story.

In 1909, there were six different pennies minted in the United States. The government started out making Indian Head cents, then switched to Lincoln cents with VDB (the designer’s initials) on the back. After a couple of days, the initials were removed. Since both the Philadelphia and San Francisco mints produced each of these one-cent coins, there were six different cents made in 1909. In total, the two mints produced about 118 million one-cent coins in 1909. In 2010, the U.S. mints produced over four billion one-cent coins!

Here are pictures of all six 1909 coins.

About 14 million 1909 Indian Head cents were minted in Philadelphia.

1909 Indian Head cents, front and back

1909 Indian Head cents from San Francisco are very valuable. Only 309,000 were made.

The "S" on the bottom of the one cent side means it was made in San Francisco1909 Indian Head cents, front and back. The back side has a small 's'

About 28 million 1909 VDB Lincoln cents were minted in Philadelphia.

See the VDB? The director of the US Mint did not like Victor D Brenner, the coin's designer, putting his initials on the new Lincoln coin1909 VDB Lincoln cents, front and back

1909-S VDB Lincoln cents from San Francisco are really rare. Only 484,000 were produced.

This is the coin in my story!1909-S VDB Lincoln cents, front and back

Lots and lots of 1909 Lincoln cents with no VDB were minted in Philadelphia…almost 73 million.

1909 Lincoln cents with no VDB, front and back

Just under 2 million 1909-S Lincoln cents with no VDB were minted in San Francisco.

1909-S Lincoln cents with no VDB

If you know something interesting about coins (especially 1909 Lincoln cents), please tell me below.

Book 1

Mystery, mice, and money at the end of fifth grade!

Read
from my book

Buy my book

read some
Reviews

back to the
Genius List

Back to list Back to top Next thing on my list

Comments from my Readers & Friends

  3. Did you know that before the Indian Head cent they made flying eagle cents?(I know because i am a Numismatist and I have one.) Before that they made LARGE cents that were actually closer to the size of a half dollar. And they made twenty cent pieces, half cents, two cents, and they are going to make five dollar coins.

  4. I am reading this for 2014 bluestem and I am so happy it is on the list because I love it. I hope on reading the 2nd book when I am done with the list.

  7. Well i know something intersting about canadian pennies. Once i had a penny that was from 1600s-1700s. Anyways i lost that penny but it was the oldest thing i ever seen in my life. Also a dollar in canadian = sixty eight cents in american.

    1. Actually, the first Canadian cent was minted in 1858, not the 1600s-1700s. You must’ve had a different coin. And the Canadian dollar is worth 98 cents in the USA, not 68 cents. (I looked all this up.)

  11. I love all your books they are just splentacular
    (that’s splendid mixed with spectacular

    Also why is your third book not illustrated by the same person

    1. Because the publisher decided to change illustrators. I didn’t have anything
      to do with it. (But I like both of them.)

  14. OMG!!!!!!!! i luv ur booooooook chessie mac it is sooo amazing ur coming tpoo my school tommoroy yay i almost fainted anyways bye c u tommorow

    1. Sort of correct and not correct, Patrik.
      I looked this up. The forint is the currency of Hungary. It is divided into 100 fillér, although fillér coins are no longer in circulation.
      So you are wrong because there are 100 fillér, but you are right because no one uses them anymore.

  16. I have a quick question where do you find those VDB coins? By the way you have to reply to this. I want to be riiiiiiiiiich!

    1. They are very rare. I bet almost all of them have been found already and are in collections. But what if there were a jar of pennies in an attic in a very old house? And no one had touched the jar for years and years…

    2. My house is old I’ve never been in the attic before so maybe. I MIGHT look over winter break.

  21. Hi ,Cheesie! It’s me,Eden again. I’m interested in learning more about those pennies. Can you teach me? (You are two years older than me, so why not?)
    Eden, not from Sweden

  23. Hey Cheesie,

    I liked your book (Cheesie Is Not A Genius Or Anything), and its pretty cool a bookmaker has his own website. BTW, what does IMO mean? You and Georgie could’ve sold the 1909-S VDB.
    But since G.J. Prott wanted it (I think, dont judge me.), you still gave it to her, also, cool for telling her the truth. Double-BTW, did you really see that figure in the window? (The vampire figure.) If you did, here is a fact:
    1. Vampires do NOT exist, unless the vampire was somebody in the costume OR it was Dracula, who is not affected by the light, if it wasnt Dracula, he would be complaining about the light.

    — From, Thomas. But you can just call me Tom. 🙂

    1. Really good comment, Tom!

      Here are my responses to what you wrote:
      • IMO is internet lingo for “In My Opinion.”
      • You’re right…what to do with the coin was a super hard decision.
      • If you re-read (carefully) the part where the vampire in the window is mentioned, you can figure out whether I saw it or not. (I give lots of info about that!)

    3. A smart alec? Who? Me or Tom?
      I wasn’t being smart…just responding to Tom’s good comment.

  26. You did a good thing adding in the coin and necklace mystery into your book. It’s another reason why I like your book. You put mystery with all these other things going on and for some reason I liked it. Keep on the good work!

    From Natalie Maxey,

    But you can call me Nata. 😉

    1. He is coming to my school Fiest Elementry in Houston,Tx im in 5th grade. He is coming this week….. YAY

      P.S. love you Cheesie Mack XD

    2. you came to our school!my school is bang elementry and im in 5th grade!i love your books.im in the middle of reading your second book.how do you come up with all of these stuff and are they really all true?

    2. Yep! I’m in sixth grade and am writing another book about what happened to me during the first couple of weeks. It’ll be book #3, but I do not have a title yet.

  38. Hey Cheesie! Do you know that the letters v.d.b. stand for.Victor David Brenner.
    your computer wiz friend, Ashley

  43. I am soooooooo confused. the page says that 309,000 Indian head-S were made and 484,000 Lincoln vbd-S cents were made. if 484,000>309,000, why is everybody
    saying the Lincoln vbd-S is the most valuable if less Indian head-S were made ???????? ?:(

  44. JC & Keni–
    Amazing, huh? That means the one-cent coin was worth 220,000 times as much as you could spend it for! Amazing!

  46. Wow! I heard some pennies were worth a hundred dollars, but i never knew they could be worth $2,200! That is so crazy! Who knew but you Cheesie!

  49. I collect coins and I find it very fun because there are so many different kinds.

Comments are closed.

Welcome to CheesieMack.com (My real name is Ronald Mack)