The 1880-CC Morgan Dollars have several varieties that occurred to save the Mint money. Dies for these coins were made at the Philadelphia mint. The Carson City Mint, like other mints at the time, frequently reused dies by repolishing and re-engraving them. This process led to overdates and different reverses.
This is a basic article without naming other VAM varieties (cataloging different die markers). Visit here if you want to learn about VAMs.
1878 and 79 Reverses
Let’s start with the two reverses, compliments PCGS CoinFacts, so that we can understand the role they play in the varieties.
Now let’s proceed to the varieties and overdates.
1880-CC Regular Strike
The 1880-CC, regular strike, has the rounded breast of 1879:
1880-CC Rev. 78 (Regular Strike)
The first variety, then, is the 1880-CC Rev. 78:
Now that we know how to distinguish which reverse, we move on them to the various overdates.
1880-CC “8 over Low 7” and “8 over High 7”
Below find markers for the 1880-CC 8 over Low 7 (Regular Strike [aka Reverse of 79]) and 8 over High 7 (Regular Strike).
If the coin is worn, you might not be able to identify what you have without a microscope, and even then you might not be able to see the low/high 7. Fortunately, many 1880-CC varieties are uncirculated from bags released by the Mint as well as GSA dollars (more on those later).
Here is a blow-up so you can tell:
Two distinctions. The 8 over Low 7 has a remnant of the 7 in the middle of the top loop of the 8 and what looks like a die chip with some space between it and the bottom of the 8; the 8 over High 7 has the remnant close to the top of the 8 and the remnant close and almost touching the bottom of the 8.
1880-CC 8/7 Rev. 78
As you now might have guessed, another variety is the 1880-CC 8 over 7 with the 78 reverse. Look for the remnant of the 7 in the top loop of the 8:
Here’s the obverse and reverse of the above coin to give you an idea of how faint the remnant is and why you might not see it in a worn version. (There are other die markers to identify which variety you have but are omitted from this article, focusing on the basics.)
1880/79-CC $1 Reverse of 1878 (Regular Strike)
Yet another variety. How did this one happen?
Dies originally intended for 1879 dated coins were repurposed for 1880 production by overpunching the date with “1880,” resulting in the visible “80/79” overdate. This practice of repurposing dies helped conserve resources at the time. The reverse die used was the “Reverse of 1878,” characterized by a flat eagle breast and parallel top arrow feather.
Values
Values for each of the varieties differ so you might want to focus on the rarer ones, especially if you have acquired GSA Dollars, which do not distinguish between the various varieties in their holders:
Here is a table with each variety’s retail worth at MS63 from CoinFacts:
VARIETY VALUE AT MS63
| 1880-CC Regular Strike | $875 |
| 1880-CC Rev. of 78 | $1450 |
| 1880-CC 8 over High 7 | $950 |
| 1880-CC 8 over Low 7 | $900 |
| 1880-CC 8 over 7 Rev. 78 | $1350 |
| 1880/79-CC Rev. of 78 | $1450 |
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