I am one of the many on this forum who search half dollars. Each week I order and search $1,000 face value. I have been at it for over a year now, and have found some odd things to date, (Tokens, Canadians, Magician coins, other denominations, etc) However, this week tops them all. Each week when I open a box, I immediately look at the top coin in each roll. You can generally tell by the color of the coin if its silver right away. Well, this week there were 3 rolls as such. I opened the first one.. and found 13 silver Halves ...8 silver halves were in the second,... and 9 in the third. This in itself is an unbelieveble turnout. But what is bizzare is that the first roll contained 6-1952 AU Franklins all in a row. The second, 5-1967 BU Kennedys, and the third 5-1964 BU Kennedys also all in a row. Keep in mind these Halves come either form the Fed or a money processing center. They are not bank customer rolls. Then... half way through the box another single roll contained 7-2002-D BU Kennedys, all in a row The rest of the box was normal, yielding the normal finds. I have some theories but no explanation. I though other bank roll searches would find this interesting and share their thoughts.....
Hi Jimmy - this sounds rather fun. What do you ask for at the bank? I think my bank would end up giving me rolls of current date material unless I specified otherwise - but, again, I have never tried it.
heck the 2002 halves are a lot less common in rolls than the 64 or silver clads, that is exceptionally strange! Congrats on the great box!! It's boxes like that one that keep me looking! I can't figure out what would cause that kind of distribution ??
Excellent finds, I'm jealous! In the past I've had rolls similar to what you've described, but I can't really come up with an explanation. In fact, last night I opened one roll that had a '67 Kennedy, a '68 Kennedy, and a '49-D Franklin. The rest from that batch of 25 rolls yielded just one more 1968. The hardest one for me to understand is when I get a roll with one or even several 1999 or 2000 coins and the roll also contains silver. That means the coins were rolled no longer than 5-6 years ago, and I would have thought that silver would have left circulation much sooner. I can understand the "older" rolls containing silver, and I do get those from time to time, but once in a while something pops up that doesn't make any sense to me. It is fun to speculate though. Still, nice finds!
That's a great find! It is too bad you can't specifically order the oldest rolls from the bottom of the pile in the back of the vault where even the workers are afraid to go. Who knows what is still out there. I only search occasionally, not consistently. And when I find something, it is always a single silver half mixed in with current date coins. I always figure a kid someplace raided dad's coin collection.
Isn’t this about the third thread in the last month where someone gets half-dollar rolls from the bank and inside finds a bonanza just slightly less imposing than the S.S. Central America treasure ? Think how that makes the rest of us losers feel ! We need some kind of warning label for these threads so that poor chumps like me who find a single 40% silver half in two rolls will know to stay away.
Rick, I simply ask the bank to order $1,000 face value of half dollars. They get them from the Fed or a money house. The coins come in rolls in 2 boxes of $500 each. I also sometimes get rolls of halves or loose halves from the teller's drawers, but they ususlly don't have many on hand. Regardless of how I request them, I sure what I get is the result of what is on hand. I don't believe any bank would disperse halves based on date criteria.
...then, after you get the $1,000 in halves, search them, and remove one coin from each roll, you are all set to buy coffee for the next couple of years with the assurance that most of the cashiers won't know what you are paying with and won't have a slot in the cash register for it.
