I am assuming that like me many buy rolls seeking a specific coin, be it a 1916d Mercury or a 1955 double strike. For decades when doing that I just dumped the other 49 coins (sometimes 50 if I found nothing) into a can or a jar, then bought another roll. A few years ago I started filling albums. Why do I still buy rolls? I dunno. It somehow just seemed easier than going through the coffee and fruit cake cans of raw pennies. Lately however I have changed my methodology for dealing with the surplus coins. What I have started doing is sorting the rejects. All of the S rejects into that can. All of the 1910 to 1919 rejects into that can, all of the 1920 - 1929 coins into that can, etc., etc. Some (to me) interesting observations begin to emerge. I have way more 1950s coins than I do circa 1920s coins. I have enough 1940s pennies. For someone who has no interest in IH pennies I have an amazing number of IH pennies in PO1 or PO2 condition. Steel 1943 and 1943D pennies are way more prolific than steel 1943S pennies. Heck I find 1909VDBs to be more prolific on rolls I search than 1943S pennies and at a 10:1 minted ratio and a much more recent vintage, that makes no sense. With 191 million steel 43S pennies made I should see them more often than once every 30 rolls, but I don't. Why is that? I have pawed through many rolls, tins and bags from both coasts. Yet I only have about 5 rolls of S marked pennies vs almost 300 sorted rolls of P and D pennies. I am presuming based on memory that if I go downstairs and start sorting the coffee cans of pennies I pulled from rolls years ago, the statistics will be about the same. <Must be almost 900 PO1 IH pennies in those cans.> Finding almost uncirculated 1957D pennies seems to be fairly easy. Finding AU 1920s coins is very rare and only 1 or 2 from the teen years comes to mind as being pulled from a roll in AU condition. I have about half a roll of 1909 variants but none of them are better than VF with many AG and a few PO. Question: Where are the S coins? Question: Why is the number of 1943S steel pennies found in rolls so low?
I started doing that as well. I don't have an exact or proven theory about it, but I think that S coins in general are more desirable. I'm not entirely sure, perhaps because they don't circulate S coins anymore. I would think since there is only one year of the steel cent, and the 1943S was the lowest minted of the three, people horde them.
It is a product of geography and number of coins minted. Steel cents disappeared from circulation quickly because they are easily recognized and removed from circulation. A redbook is very useful in providing much of this information.
Reject means it is a coin found in a roll by me, but I don't need that coin for the album I am filling on that particular day. Usually, and almost always, a duplicate of something else I already pulled from the roll. Canadian pennies is another good example of my reject horde. A good example would be 1957D coins. For a statistically unknown reason many rolls I see have two or three of them. I tried selling a bunch of 57D pennies on Ebay a year or so ago, but very few were interested which tells me it is a 'reject coin' for a lot of roll hunters. @ Evan. It isn't geography. I am speaking of purchased rolls, not pocket change found at the end of the day. The Internet allows buying rolls from folks in California as easily as it allows buying rolls from folks in Pennsylvania or Colorado. Scarcity of issue doesn't seem to logically be a factor regarding the 1943S penny, not when I compare it to coins with much smaller mint numbers. The example cited, 1909 VDB is an excellent for instance. Production of the 1909VDB was a mere 27.9 million. Production of the 1943S was 191.5 million. Factor in age and Federal Reserve bank culls of worn out coins. Statistically I should be seeing 5 times as many 1943S coins. Instead I am seeing 2 or 3 1909VDBs for every 1943S Lincoln. I have 6 spare (reject) 1943S pennies (doesn't include the ones sitting inside a dozen albums), but 22 spare 1909VDB (last comment, ibid). Statistically assuming random deposits into a bank or some other place where coins are rolled, the reverse should be true. It isn't. Strange. Are all of the missing 1943S pennies lost to Collector Hoarding of steel cents? Not in my opinion. If it were, then I shouldn't be finding one or two 1943P or D pennies in every other roll. I am thinking maybe the number of 1943S coins actually released into circulation is maybe much lower than the number supposedly produced. No, I don't wish to buy any, but I did expect to see random statistically probable numbers of them inside rolls from many sources. Some other years coins also come to mind as not meeting my projections of statistically probable to encounter pennies. For instance, I have what I feel is way too many 1939D pennies (most in AG3). With only 15.1 million made, it should be much scarcer than the 1943S or even the 09VDB. Nah, I have as many 39D as I do of the plain 09 VDB. Hmm, the relevant question is who else is accruing similar statistics?
Agreed, sort of. However since we are talking about coins from rolls, bags and bins of any source, that enters into it. Generally speaking the pre culled rolls where the vender lied about whether or not the roll was searched (famous escape clause: "I have not searched this roll." LoL. No, his employee did.), those rolls stand out when you search them. Nothing bright and shiny except the 57D pennies, some late 40s coins in AG and maybe a single Fair from the 30s with nothing from the 20s or the teens. No I speak of receivership sales and a few good sources including actual inheritances where I was the first picker. Seen coin distribution isn't matching the predicted numerical stats. Sometimes I see way more 20s and 30s in those. Only last night I did two rolls which had nothing at all later than 1947. I have to add, I don't do bags or rolls that contain coins made after 1959. Therefore the sources are limited when seeking stuff that hasn't been cherry picked. I buy a fair amount from genuine estate sales/auctions, but also a lot off Ebay. Ebay wise I have only found one seller who thusfar consistently offers good bags of Wheat pennies (if you don't object too much to the occasional 1930s vintage Canadian penny). Possible long term investment strategy for not yet born great-great-grandchildren. Buy some new rolls at the bank. Bury them deep in one of those designed for burial artillery shell cannisters somewhere on the family land. Give a sealed letter to a law firm advising of the burial location with instructions to deliver the letter to your descendants or the land owners in 150 years. If the descendants have been good worker bees, they will still have the land. If not, they deserve nothing.
