It is easy for collectors to look at the mintage numbers and assume that finding good coins are easy. This week I purchased a group of 1969 Mint sets, searching for a gem example of a Jefferson and Washington. After carefully searching, not one was found. These are all original sealed envelopes. Most are struck with worn dies and if removed from the package, would have a hard time being sold as Unc. Most have the ugliest toning. Here is an example of each. It really isn't that easy to find gem coins in the pre 90's coins. The fifties and sixties are very difficult. So don't let the numbers fool you.
As far as I know, the Mint's soft plastic has always been Mylar, at least in my time, so I have no idea what all that junk is. A bad rinse of planchets? Who knows. You are right, though, and maybe this is a sign that high end clad stuff from the early years will be really desirable one day.
The '69 mint set is my favorite so I have to comment. The coins are all rarely very nice in this set. The Denver dime isn't extremely tough and the Denver quarter is a little tougher but finding superb gems of these coins was very difficult the day they left the mint. In the original sets up to 4% of the D dimes were very choice and about 3% of the quarters. The half was close behind. These sets were everywhere and they could be purchased for less than face value because no one wanted them. Over the years the number of sets and their contents have simply been decimated. Most of these sets are cut up and gone forever with the coins often just put into circulation. The sets that remain are usually damaged by tarnish and corrosion. This set contains what is perhaps the most underrated of all moderns; the Philly quarter. Most of these in the sets are abysmal. Only about 5% of the remaining coins can even be considered choice unc. Most modern collectors consider this the mimimum collectible grade and there are very few of these still available now days. These sets are not going to yield up very many more gems simply because there are too few left. This is a BU roll which for practical purposes doesn't exist. I've been looking for rolls since 1972 and have never seen one intact. About ten years ago I ran into one that had been split open and was being used to make change in a coin shop. The dealer sold me the balance of it. He knew the roll had a premium but said he had no customers for such things. The coins I saw back in 1969 were almost always very poorly made and it is very difficult to find one of these in circulation without extreme wear. Even when the '69 sets left the mint only about one in 300 was really gem quality. The biggest problem with these was that the marking on the planchets was not obliterated by the strike. Even gems tend to be rougher than other dates. The Denver quarter appears sometimes with a very silky luster and will sometimes be PL. This coin tends to have strike weakness in many cases, but the gems aren't rare. It also is very tough to find in rolls but is seen on rare occasion.
