Doesn't the US MInt Really stink!

I was being facticious. Every once in a while someone posts a ridicules assult on the Mint and it just ticks me off.

The Mint does an incredable job and their coin quality gets better every year while putting out mind bending numbers of coins, not just for the US, but also on contract with a bunch of other foriegn nations.

Occsionally they have customer service glitches or even packaging problems, but when you stack that against the quality they produce and their mission (they're NOT NOT NOT a PROFIT DRIVEN BUSINESS or a McDonalds), it is beyound me how they can keep up these standards year after year.

Its been only in the last few years that the Lincolns are even normally COMPLETE in the strike. By the standards of the 1970's standards, everything minted would by MS66.

Look at a new Cent, and then look at an MS66 cent from 1953, and then tell me that the mint is incompetitent.

Ruben

 

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Maybe, but the sky is Blue and that coin is frankly incredable.
It is museum quality art.

Ruben

 

You can't please everybody. I actually like seeing some new ideas. The old designs will always be classic but they're getting worn out IMO. You can't keep repackaging the past forever.

 

BTW - for the most pat those old designs could never stand up to the current versions. The current ASE makes the original half look amaturish. I think the Buffalo looks aweful in gold and the design is doesn't tranfer well. It worked best and was designed for the era's tools and for Nickel.

They can't make a 57 chevey either, so hey. That isn't a knock.

The St Gual design is like the ASE. The standard output of the Mint today not only has a better version of the design, but cream of the crop mintages that people would have drooleed for in the 1920's are standard by the West Point Mint's normal production.

There is just no prespective. Its a McDonalds world with a lot of obese people making critism from their couch while flipping their remote.

Ruben

 

I'm glad I read the entire thread and did not respond to the first post as I was so tempted to do.

 

Yes, yes and yes. I agree about the past. But the presidential dollars look like gumball machine prizes. Sackies I think had a decent design but shoud have been bigger.....more substantial. SBAs? A huge mistake. The full face Jefferson 5¢ is pretty good but only a collecter would notice the change.

Pleasing everyone is impossible I agree. New ideas? Absolutely. But when was the last time a coin minted for circulation made you say WOW?

 

The Presidential series looks like hell. I agree. They were stuck with that thing. And the Jeff full head, I think suffers a similar problem. But this is not a knock on the Mint's quality. The quality of the Presidential series is excelent, even with the glitchs involving the unreadable side lettering.

I hear that the Nickel is going back to the origianal design next year. Many of the Commemoratives have been just unbelievable.

Ruben

 

I'm loving the availability of so many designs. When I was growing up in the '60s there was not very much in the way of variety from the US Mint, and absolutely no commemorative program. Young collectors have so much to choose from today. Now there are those who would say that it is all junk and will never increase in value....I say that as a collector I don't care, it's what I like and I enjoy getting it. I'm in it purely for the love of the hobby itself, not for financial gain. If I had to worry about investing and turning a profit I'd have money in the stock market, and look how good those fella's are doin' now 'a days.

 

FWIW - the 2005 Joe Fitzgerald Jefferson Obverse Nickel, which IMO, they should have kept. But the question is unfair because the coin design is stuck and haven't changed in decades.

Ruben

 

Well, good point. We've been stuck on a lot of pretty plain designs for a long time. I can't get that excited over the presidential dollars. Although, given what they're trying to do with them, I couldn't tell you what a better design should have been. The reverse looks ok to me I guess.

I didn't care for the state quarters until about a month ago, I started collecting them from circulation and the silver proofs.

With them, I think they'll be much more appreciated down the road. We've just been inundated with them for 9 years so they're not that big of a deal right now. There were huge mintages. They'll be around a long time. But I bet collectors will appreciate them a lot more 100 years from now and into the future.

I'd like to see them change some designs just once again, like they used to, instead of having 50 different types of quarters, 4 different types of nickels, etc...

I think the Kennedy design is past due for a change. 45 years is long enough. These being one of the larger coins, they should be able to come up with something creative. Hopefully.

 

How about this detail. Is that poor quality or what?

 

""I think the Kennedy design is past due for a change. 45 years is long enough. These being one of the larger coins, they should be able to come up with something creative. Hopefully.""


I'm partial to the Kennedy halves. I was in grade school when he was murdered. It was the first national tragedy I lived through.

Perhaps 45 years is long enough. What would be interesting is the likely opposition to taking JFK off the half. I think it would be enormous.

 

More Lousy work by that Mint! Anyone want a Full Hand?

 

Yeah, you're probably right. I've put together the full P & D set up to '08, in mostly MS. I'd like to see a new design though.