Even in the ‘70’s the Mint made no effort to display or have quality control. A nice silver set but the 3 coins are not that great in my opinion.
I have two of the 3-coin Silver Proof Set, and they put the UNC Set to shame. Each coin is in an airtite.
True. Back then there was no special effort. They are lustrous uncirculated business strikes...completed with typical bag marks.
These coins were struck in the Mint State format, not as Proofs. Therefore the Mint did not take as much care with them as they would have Proof coins after they were struck. The target audiences for these coins were coin collectors and the general public. The mint made almost 5 million of these sets for that purpose. The sales were well below expectations and sets were available for years. Since the general public would not be as fussy as collectors, quality control was not the highest priority.
That sucks that those proof coins are so beat up. The silver dollar has a bad reed hit on it too. I don't see any "frost" on any of those coins. Aren't proofs supposed to have a mirror shine at the low points and "frost" on the high points? I was lucky and got a bicentennial proof quarter at the change quarter machine a few years ago. Mine shows "frost". I figured that all proofs have this. Is that not true? For the purpose of referencing the coins by the op, below are pix of the bicentennial quarter I got in the quarter machine at the carwash a few years ago. Why would there be a difference? They are both "S" proofs.
So there are two type of coins that come out of the San Francisco mint, uncirculated sets and proof sets. I got it now. Thanks.
These coins look in far better condition than the coins in the op. The coins in the op have silver content?
The coins that @Copper lover posted are proof coins, and the ones that @Collecting Nut posted are silver-clad business strike coins I believe, that is why they look so different
Not proof sets, just a sealed silver 3 coin set that Mint employees didn’t have too much respect for. Even back then they were more interested in sales than quality. The Mint has totally forgotten that better coins will bring more money in to them. You can’t save money by cutting quality as that hurts sales.
Here is a 1976 Bicentennial set you may not have seen before. These were sold at the 1976 ANA show that was held in New York City. I was lucky enough to get Mint Director, Mary Brooks', autograph. I don't think that she signed very many of them.
Yes, they didn't finally melt down the unsold coins until 1982. I have to admit that is a new one for me, never saw that before.
I've seen a lot of the '76 sets posted lately. I like silver and 1976 was the year I graduated from high school, so I felt the need to pick one up. Surprisingly, this low priced eBay find was nicer than I expected. Few bag marks. Slight toning on the Ike. Sorry for the lousy photos.