One of the major undocumented details in the 3 Cent Nickel series are the diagnostic markers present on the proof issues for each year of issue from 1865 through 1889. Many years have only one pair of dies that struck proof coins and the rest of the years have a few different proof dies for each year.

In an effort to begin to sort out these proof coins, we will attempt to show closeup details of every proof die we can get an example of. Click on each date below to go to the details for that date of proofs.


1871 Proofs : Mintage: 960, Die Pairs: 1, maybe 2

1873 Proofs : Mintage: 1100, Die Pairs: 1

1875 Proofs : Mintage: 700, Die Pairs: 2

1878 Proofs : Mintage: 2350, Die Pairs: 1