Roosevelt Dime Collecting

The Roosevelt Dime, it is hard to get excited this series. Still in production, few key dates (double-digit prices) and not much doing in varieties. However, if you want to build a set of silver BU coins, it provides an inexpensive opportunity.
Grab a dansco album (I picked up a slightly used one for $13) and you will not have to break the break to have nice shiny silver dimes looking back at you. At one show, I came across silver proofs selling for $.70. At current silver prices, that is even below melt value. More often, you will find nice uncs not much over melt.
Of course, unless silver skyrockets, you cannot expect Roosevelt Dimes to appreciate greatly. However, it is an easy and inexpensive set to put together and it can be fun. This series is for the collector hobbyist and certainty not the investor.
Want to open the wallet and seek a bigger challenge? There is goal of creating a set of full band or torch lines.

 

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nice write up, so what is considered the key coin, the 49 S or 96 W

 

Thanks. You are correct.

The 1949 S is a key for lack of a better term. Redbook numbers claims 13.5 million minted.
The 1951 S had over 31 million minted so an above melt coin.
The 1964 D has a double die reverse.
As for the clad, as you pointed out, the 1996 W was a mint set coin. It could run you over $10 price tag.

The rest of both silver and clad are very common.

 

I believe the '62 has an unattributed DDR. Don't wanna bother sending mine out for authentication, but a member posted pics of one that has identical doubling as mine. I'll just take the liberty of copying his reverse pic so you can see what I mean.



Not sure how to tell DD's from MD, but I think it would be relatively rare to see two coins from the same year and mint mark with identical MD. Here's a link to the post;

http://www.cointalk.com/t125339/#post977169

The doubling I speak of shows mostly in the legend. I can see some in the lower stem and leaf tips on mine under a 10x loupe.

 

Why do people always say the 49S? Isn't the 55 a little less of a mintage?

 

I bought a partial set on silver dimes on E-bay just for the silver value. When I got it home there were a lot of really nice dimes in the folder. With a local coin show coming up that weekend I made a list of the ones I wanted to upgrade and had a lot of fun going through the dealers binders. I too found some great looking bright unc dimes for around the $1.50 mark. Only a couple coins left to upgrade and I'll have a pretty sharp set with a lot of eye appeal.

 

Oh you can plunk some change down for these guys. Start looking at high-end Proofs from 1950-54.

The 1955 roosevelts were hoarded from day 1 as they had the lowest mintages up to that point - so they're more "plentiful" than some of the other dates such as 49/50/51 S-mints. I maintain the prices for the 49-S and 50-S are inflated.

As the OP said, this set probably isn't going anywhere except whereever the price of silver is going. It's handicapped by missing that one "gee-whiz I wish I could own it" coin such as the 1916-D for the mercury dimes. The Franklin Halves have this same problem.

 

Ltrain:
what is the PUP (pick up point) for that DDR?

 

The Jefferson's are also like the Rosie's. You pretty easily fill up a set. There are no real show stoppers. Although a complete set is not the same as say, Lincolns or Morgans, I love looking at my albums with no holes looking back at me. I'm a few away from closing the Lincolns and as for the Morgans, well you know that situation.

 

Don't bother buying the just the W dime. The dime will cost almost the same as the whole set.

 

I will admit that the Roosevelt dime series was the first one I took seriously. I think it's a nice intro set for those wishing to try out a series, especially novice young collectors. I am very happy with my complete set and then went for Mercs. In short I think, yes, the series is underrated, but it has it's worth for learning how to grade and collect somewhat seriously. Besides, the torch is freakin' awesome! And just for number's sake...where is the 2009 mintage in the scheme of possible key?

 

If you mean the point where it's most noticeable, I first noticed it around the A and ES of STATES. If you didn't, then I don't know what PUP refers to.

 

Duke you are right the 55 has about 1 million less than 49-s

 

Roosevelt Dime MS/Proof 1946-64 & 1950-64 Proof are one the most over look coin I know of. hex on ebay u can get a Ngc/Pcgs MS-66-67 FB for less than $30.00! proof PR-66-68 Ultra Cameo/DCAM for about the same price.that why I been almost stealing them!

 

Or if you really want a challenge, try to complete the older silver set (46-64) from circulation.:devil:

I have 23 out of 48? so far

 

Haha, I've got tons of dupes while trying to do this from boxes. Finding lots of Mercs too, which I'm really enjoying. Earliest dime I've found so far was a 1924.

 

My set is from circulation. The thrill of the hunt.

My hardest one to find was the 2009 D, but I finally found one.

My Dansco is filled, with no holes

 

Being on the West coast, I have a hard time finding the P coins.

 

The poor Roosevelt is really overlooked for whatever reason. Sometimes thats a good thing. I've put together three and a half silver Rosie sets for very minimal cost.
GUy

 

I've built a 46-64 set of roosies in unc a while ago, then bought a complete set from 46-86 with all the silver proofs from 53-64 for $120. They are a really, really inexpensive set