Question about survival estimates of 1916 Liberty Standing Quarter Vs 1916-D Dime

Hey guys,

I have a question regarding the survival estimates of the 1916-D Dime vs 1916 Liberty Standing Quarter.

In research of both coins, PCGS estimates 10,000 existing of both.

My questions are, how is this the case and why? Wouldn’t there be far less of the 1916 Quarter? And was the Quarter saved more than the Dime??

The 1916 Liberty Standing had a mintage of 52,000, less than a quarter of the mintage of the 1916-D Dime.

Going by the figures of the New York Subway Hoard, which Documented just 19 examples of the 1916 Quarter, and 241 of the 1916-D Dime.

In the 1940’s up until the 60’s, wouldn’t a Quarter have been less likely to have been saved than a Dime, which had a lower face value, thus, contributing to a lower survival rate? More in circulation = More attrition.... BUT..... there were far fewer Quarters made. The fact that so many of the Dime were in circulation when so little of the quarter was is curious. The Dime circulated more, but there were over 4 times as many made. It is indicated that 3.79% of the mintage Of 1916-D exists, as compared to the much higher 19.23% of the 1916 Quarter.........


Please enlighten me here. Forgive me if this is a stupid question.

 

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Go to any coin show. Ask around if anyone has a 1916-D Mercury Dime and/or a 1916 Standing Liberty Quarter. You will probably find between half a dozen and a dozen '16-D dimes (most likely in AG to G condition). You are not likely to find ANY '16 SL quarters. The 1916 SL quarter is RARE. The 1916-D Merc dime is SCARCE.

 

I will agree 100%. 1916-D is NOT a rare coin as many indicate! (Does not stop me from loving it) I remember at Long Beach about 5 years ago there were at least 20 1916-D. I’m just curious as to why PCGS doesn’t indicate far less of the Quarter.

 

I believe this is correct. You also have to factor in that the SL quarter was only made at one mint. The dime was made at all three mints. To make it even more fun, the Barber dime and quarter were still being made in 1916.

I can't back this up because I was not alive in 1916 but I was told that at that time most collectors didn't collect by mint mark. They just wanted a nice example of each date. With the Mercury dime they had three choices.
Good question. Got me thinking.

 

I have read similar. As late as the mid 1920's I have read you could find BU rolls of 1916 SL on the bourse floor of the ANA conventions. Remember that Philadelphia has the main town of coin dealers back then, and they kept track of what the mint was doing. If something new was being made in December of that year they made sure they went to the mint and bought many rolls and/or bags of the coins for later profit. The 1916d dime, however, coming from Denver did not have this built in dealer market and at the time it really wasn't flagged as something special.

Having said that, I also disagree of total pop figures. I could buy 10,000 of each surviving in BU condition, (the 1916d is actually much more common in BU than other early mercs), but cannot fathom that only 10,000 16 D's exist.

 

NGC and PCGS have graded nearly 13,000 1916D Mercury dimes. You have to figure at least that many more are in other slabs or ungraded.

They have graded 2783 1916 SLQs.

Given that the mintage of the dime was 264,000, and the quarter was 52,000, we find that there were about 5x more dimes minted than quarters. We find that roughly 5x more dimes were certified than quarters.

Thus, we can surmise that the survival rates were fairly similar.

 

But if the survival RATES are the same then the number of surviving quarters would still be 1/5 the number of surviving dimes, not equal as PCGS gives for their survival estimates.

 

I'm not sure where the OP saw these survival estimates, or where those numbers came from. The numbers in my post are directly from the census reports. The census reports clearly show 1/5 the number of quarters as dimes graded, exactly as I would expect.

 

I got these figures directly from the PCGS Coinfacts website.

 

Provide links people!

 

Both very thought-inspiring points.

Being that the Barbers were still being made in the year 1916, how would you figure that this affected saving? I know you weren’t alive, but just your opinion. Did you think people tried to save an example of the date of each series?

Also- another interesting thought about 3 different mints of the Dimes!

ETA: welp. My attempt to highlight your comment got screwed up.

 

1916-D Page: (PCGS)
http://www.pcgscoinfacts.com/coin/detail/4906

1916 Quarter Page: (PCGS)
http://www.pcgscoinfacts.com/coin/detail/5704

 

I wouldn't put a whole lot of stock in those numbers. With 13k graded, you have to figure about 20% are resubmissions and duplicates, which means they have still seen over 10,000. That doesn't include the ones in other holders, or ones which have never been submitted. In the Heritage archives, they have actually sold *more* in ANACS slabs than they have in NGC - although we have no idea how many have been crossed over. I think the 10k estimate is erroneously low for the Merc, and erroneously high for the SLQ.

There are some good discussions of this subject in this old thread: https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/187820/how-many-16-d-dimes-are-there

 

When the silver market exploded a number of years ago , people were melting anything that had any weight to it. Quarters may have been subjected to more being melted down then the dimes. This may be one possible reason there are more dimes around then quarters. Wild guess! dillan

 

The problem with that theory is that, by the time of the great silver melts, the scarcity of the 1916 coins was already well understood. They earned premiums over common dates - and even when metal prices soared, they still were worth more than melt. There were very few Merc dates that a dealer of the time cared about, but they would have picked out any 1916D Merc or 1916 SLQ, because they were worth more than that.

 

Dillan, that guess would be plausible if there were less quarters estimated than the Dimes, but in this case, the estimates indicate they have approximately the same survivals.

 

The CoinFacts estimates are just a guess. I'll guess those figures have not been updated in many years, if ever.

 

Remember also, the certified census of TPGs may be inflated d/t the same coin being submitted for grading numerous times. I would think these 1916 beauties would certainly be candidates for such attempts. The higher the value of a coin the more of the jump-up in price for a single grade higher.

 

Thanks everyone for the info , It was a far off guess which I see was wrong. Thanks I learn something new on here everyday . !! Dillan

 

So do I, and I hope everyone else does too. That is the point of being here IMHO, sharing knowledge, learning something, and maybe make an internet friend or two.