Another ridiculous cash register find

Bad part is, she took the time to go through this process for the sake of acquiring about 2.5 gallons of gas. Shes probably not doing too well.

 

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I've had this argument on this very board before.

1. The coin is circulated.
2. The coin is dirty.
3. The coin is worth melt value.
4. After cleaning, the coin will still be worth melt value.

I would not clean a coin that has value above the intrinsic metal value. This has none. I will clean it if I so choose, as it will NOT hurt the value of this coin.

Joe

 

Nice score!

My son works at a drive thru. Last year he came home with a Silver Eagle that someone used as a $1 coin to buy a pack of smokes with. He has been trained well, he brought it home to Daddy and I gave him $1 for it.....is that unethical? LOL

 

I would be cautious cleaning this coin. There are some really odd-ball VAMs out there, and cleaning rarely improves value (it often degrades eye appeal for even dirty, well-circulated coins IMO).

A steam treatment would probably take most of the genuine gunk off, without affecting the coin's surface at all.

 

Yes, BadThad, that is called taking advantage of minors! hah.

 

I think that's an awesome find there, hrhomer. I understand getting coins/bills this way, as I was a bartender for 8 years back in the 1970's, and many of the coins/bills in my collection came from folks spending them for their drinking pleasure.

I see nothing wrong in taking the coin for what the customer meant it for, then trading the $ value in the drawer with your own money.

I was so busy as a bartender, I didn't have time to talk to people who gave me silver dollars, silver certificates, old coins, or whatnot. When I recognized I "might" have something collectible, I'd set it aside in a spot in my drawer, and look at it more closely later, to decide if I wanted to then buy it out of the drawer.

Most memorable is 5 Silver Certificates a girl gave me one evening for a few drinks. 35+ years later, I still have them.

Robert

 

Bars are busy, gas stations aren't usually that busy... plus, how many people here go inside to buy something when they get gas? I couldn't tell you the last time I walked into a gas station... swipe my card and fill her up.

 

Speaking of cash register finds. I went to the Royal Farms gas station near where I live and I got a 2002 Mississippi S quarter in change. My first proof I've gotten in circulation. I was ecstatic, though the lady behind the counter looked at me like I was from outer space. Then she said "I've got a bunch of presidential dollar coins, so I took those too. Nothing special there. Though in the batch was a 2000 P Sacawagea.

 

I almost always go in and get a $1 lottery ticket. I guess I'm just an optimist...

But seriously, a lot of people still go inside to pay. Gas stations make next to nothing on selling gas; they turn all of their profit from people coming inside and adding a drink or a snack to their bill.

 

I'm always amazed at the number of folks that can be critical when a user posts an incredible find!
Eventually the thread turns into questioning the "ethics" of the OP who then rightfully defends his/her position and usually gets fairly bent out of shape and then walks away wondering what the heck happened!

OK, fine, you'd have handled it another way. You're a stand up guy but then, you weren't really there and you have no idea what the circumstances surrounding the transaction might have been. None.

Just for the information of the general public, there are folks out there that simply DO NOT CARE. They are not afflicted with the same obsessive compulsive behavior that a lot of collectors are infected with! Most view coin collecting as trivial and non-sensical and view coins simply as money. Nothing more and nothing less. I'm always pointing out relative values of what I find to my family but, they just do not see it the way I do. None have developed an interest in even looking at their money!

A few months back, a lady came into my local bank with bags and rolls of Kennedy Half Dollars that she wanted to deposit in her account. My wife happened to view the transaction through the Drive Up tellers window which just happenes to have a clear view of the tellers windows.

She called me and I trotted down and bought every one of them.

The teller had spotted quite a few silver coins in the clear plastic bag and when I inquired, she related that she "had" informed the customer that there was silver in the bags and that she "might" want to consider visiting a Coin Shop so that she could get more than face value for the coins.

The customer did not care. She simply wanted to get rid of the coins as she was tired of looking at them.

That decision, by that customer, put $1,000 into my pocket even though she was fully informed. The rolls of coin yielded some very nice Kennedy's with a few RPM's and DDO's that had obviously been collected. For the record, this was a middle aged woman who was a regular customer of the bank and not a young lady who was fencing stolen coins for her boyfriend.

You really had to be there.

Do I feel bad for her? Sure but then I realize that "she" doesn't feel bad since "she" was doing what "she" wanted to do! NOT what I might have "thought" she was doing.

Sure it would be nice to educate the general public about coins so that they could profit from their accumulations or finds but to most it would simply be a bore and in the OP's case, the lady was in there to buy gas, not get a lesson on coin values.

Congrats to the OP!

Nice find!

 

Most righteous find bud. It reninds me of when I bought five rolls of Large Dollars,the first four I searched were skunks, the last contained a 1921 Morgan and 1923 Peace. CONGRATS!!!

 

Well, I started to write a response to this thread, and it was turning in to a novel, with all of my explanations and such, so, to make a long story short.

A neighbor of mine had a Silver Dollar back in November, that got me to looking through my Silver Dollars.

When I visited him a few weeks later, he said he had spent his buying some gum at a local convenience store...

I thought "AW SHUCKS".. or something like that! I told him if he EVER gets another Silver Dollar, and doesn't want to keep it, I'll buy it from him anywhere from $5 to $20 depending on what it is.

I can't believe he spent a Large Silver Dollar for a pack of GUM!!!!!

I think it was an Eisenhower, 1970's, but not certain. When I saw he had it back in November, I thought it was a coin he kept on him "all the time", that had some significance to the past, but no, it was JUST a Dollar to him.

Robert

 

Ike's aren't worth much over face because they're clad, not silver...

 

Understood! Still, I can't imagine spending any of my "Silver" Dollars....

 

True story. Three Christmases ago I was in line atFry's Electronics to buy some stuff. As the line moved up I noticed a bill lying on the floor. Picking it up, it was a $100. Wow, early present. Shortly after a guy was walking up the line asking if someone had found money. I held it out to him and he took it and scurried away. As I was walking out, he was paying for his purchases and turned around and thanked me. He said his grandmother had given him the money to buy gifts for her to give to people and if he had lost it he would not have been able to replace it. I know it is not the same, but this just brought it back to me.

 

My last visit to the bank I asked if they had any large dollars and the teller mentioned that someone came in recently with 20 Morgan/Peace dollars and asked for a $20 bill. The teller told the customer that they were silver and worth a lot more, but the customer said they came from his dead Aunt and he just wanted a bill instead of the coins. The tellers divided the coins among themselves.

 

I was talking about coins with a teller at My Favorite Bank, and she said that she'd gotten a call from a lady who wanted to know if they "took old dollar coins". She said that she explained that the lady could probably get more money by taking them to a coin store, but the lady replied that she "didn't have time for that".

You can't always protect people from themselves. Some people apparently just aren't wired for financial wisdom. Do I take an hour or two, take these coins to a dealer, and get a couple hundred dollars, or do I deposit them at the bank/spend them at the gas station? "I don't know nothin' about coins, and I don't trust them dealers, but I know the bank'll take 'em."

I try to remember that I'm privileged to have some aptitude for this, and to be able to spare the time and attention to pursue this hobby. Not everyone is.

Besides, this is just part of the numismatic "circle of life". A given coin gets spent again and again, and then falls into the hands of a collector. The collector keeps and enjoys it for a while, maybe sells it to another collector. Eventually, though, it falls into the hands of someone who doesn't understand it, and they just spend it -- and the cycle begins again.

 

I find it somewhat amusing that frequently when someone posts of a great find like the OP did, others will climb on their moral high horse, denounce the person as less-than-ethical and then proclaim to the world that, if they were in his shoes, they would have never, ever done such a thing.
Talk is cheap, I suppose.

 

Huh? :scratch: What about those pesky 1971-1976 40% silver Ikes...?

 

Some Ikes where silver from 1971-1976 * However * They were the ones you got from the mint. They came with a token in an envelope. It is possible to find some in circulation, but its only when someone took it out of the plastic and decided to spend it for face value.