Rarity of "S" mintmarks

I live in the south central part of the USA (Oklahoma) and I rarely ever see S minted coins. I see Ds and Ps all the time. Is it possible that S coins just don't circulate around here as much as D coins and P coins?

 

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Probably. I see S minted cents all the time here in CA (older coinage) but rarely see any Philly minted coins. Location has everything to do with it.

 

Since 1975, the San Francisco mint has only been used for proof coins, so you're not going to see them in circulation. On older coins, I guess it's just a matter of geography.

 

very rare to find modern S marked coins in circulation, but it does happen, people do break open mint sets an rolls an spend proofs, last week i received a 2001S rhode island state quarter proof in change, my first in over 50 years...

 

I think that S mintmark coins are somewhat scarce in circulation to begin with due to their age, and more so the farther you are from San Francisco. Here in Texas I find maybe one cent or nickel minted in SF per month.

 

In the Chicago area "S" mint coins were always scarce , so if I found one I'd take it out of circulation , which if enough people were doing it would make them even scarcer . Can't say I've seen an S minted coin in circulation for a long time .

 

I'm in new york. The most common S coin I find is 1970S jefferson. 99% of the san francisco coins I find are late 60's-early 70's pennies and nickels. The only S quarters I have ever found was a 1968 and a 1999 connecticut proof.

Over the summer I had a really strange find, in a bank wrapped roll of pennies there were 7 1973S cents, most were nearly uncirculated. I would love to know the story of how that happened. My guess was that the bank somehow received a large amount of 1973S pennies and mixed them with everything else before rolling them.

 

The latest San Francisco-minted coin that I pulled out of circulation was a 1946-S nickel that I yanked out of a roll on 11-28 (today is 12-1).

 

Some days I'll open a roll of pennies and there will be 6 or 7 BU or AU pennies with an odd shine to them. They'll mostly be from the '60s and early '70s, but sometimes I'll find the shiny pennies with the wheat reverse. I too wonder where they came from.

 

Got a 69s nickel yesterday at the gas station

 

Another find with an S mintmark is this 1976-S silver bicentennial quarter. I collect biceys (even though they're not worth anything) and I found this one and grabbed it. Later on I looked at it and thought "wait a minute, something's not quite right here" and finally I figured out that it was 40% silver. This is one of my favorite finds.

 

Just to add to what a couple of other posters have stated about geography and collectors pulling them out of circulation, another reason is that for any given year, S mintages are usually much lower than P's and D's.

 

I'm in San Francisco, and let me tell you, it's tough not seeing many philly-minted coins. The majority I get are Denver cents, followed by SF, and Philadelphia bringing up the rear.

 

Location, location, location people..........

 

yup, i'm on the east coast an i've seen less than a dozen 2013d cents in circulation this year....

 

I grew up on the East coast and with the exception of a few trips to San Francisco as a child and other person's collections I never until I was in my 20s encountered an S marked coin. Even then, that was on a trip to Arkansas. Nowadays (thank you Internet) they are no further away than Ebay. Still I have seen them in change a few times in the past decade. I suspect kids inheriting Dad, Mom's or Grandparent's coin collections a) have no idea why someone had bags or books of old coins, and b) have no clue at all about silver coins and S marks.

 

At work, there have been many coins spent by customers that were worth far more than face value. I think your theory is correct, as is the fact that the economy is in the tank and many collectors are spending their coins at face value.

 

http://www.pcgs.com/prices/PriceGuideDetail.aspx?MS=1&PR=1&SP=1&c=733 ...... Here's a scale!

 

A little hard to read. What are those numbers on the top? Does the 4 mean the set was only AG4?

 

I could see someone spending the coins out of mint sets if they only have a few to begin with. To sell them takes time and effort, and to some, this is more valuable then the dollars. I feel that way towards a few of the coins I have. There are coins I would take melt for rather than holding out for more money. It's just that I'm in no rush to do either.