In a few days I am going to buy rolls from a bank. I have a few questions: 1. What denomination of of coins am I likely to find errors? 2. What is a good way to search the rolls? 3. What denomination of coins are you likely to find old coins such as late 19th century to early 20th century? Thanks
I'm new to this as well but your best bet are cents or nickels. Any of the higher denominations have been mostly well searched for silver, so anything before 1964 is for the most part out of circulation. Nickels are nice but you won't find anything older than 1938 generally, can't say for sure since I've only gone through 10-20 rolls of nickels, I did find a war nickel though (1943). As for cents, I tend to find a wheat cent every 5th roll or so, earliest I've found is 1920 so far. OTOH years ago (90's) my mom got a flying eagle cent in change from Mcdonalds.
Cents make for some serious roll-searchin' fun. A buck gets you two rolls to tear through.....I haven't found anything too dramatic yet, mostly just wheat cents and fodder for the copper stash. I do Kenneday halves too just for fun, as well as nickels. Been at it about 6 months and wheats have been my biggest find thus far.
I'd say cents as well. I've searched maybe 1000 rolls and the earliest I've found was a 1910, but there are definitely more early dates out there. People keep huge stashes of pennies lying around in their houses for decades and when they finally return them it adds a good amount of older coins into circulation. With nickels I've found some older coins (1940s-50s, and a few 1938-1939s) as well as a few wartime silvers. I've heard Jefferson nickels are the only coin variety you can complete entirely out of circulation these days. Dimes and Quarters are tough. I don't really search them as often because they usually just yield roll upon roll of 1965-date clads. I've had better luck with dimes than quarters though, finding 5 silvers in maybe 50-100 rolls. The only silver quarter I found an old lady paid with at the sandwich shop I worked at, a 1951-D. If you can find them, halves are a great way to find silver as well. As far as errors... I don't have the patience to go over every single coin in a 2500 penny box with a fine tooth comb needed to find the errors. I usually grab the ones that stand out, which to date has only been a 10% off-center 1987 Lincoln. I find Lincolns to be the most fun to search by far because of the frequency you find the wheats. I've even found a few steels of every mintmark. Good luck!
the pennies are the denomination that you're most likely to find late 19th century/ early 20th century coins in rolls.
The odds that you will find anything old are very slim. You might find a Buffalo nickel every few boxes, or an IHC every 25 boxes, or you might never. I've searched rolls for a year, sporadically, as well as been a cashier for 20 years, and have found one IHC and 3 or 4 Buffalos. HOWEVER - it is definitely FUN to roll search. Completing a run of Jeffersons from rolls is one of my goals! Joe
1. one cent coins 2. one-by-one, by hand, over a sheet of white paper or cloth because coins are dirty, don't mess up your nice table and consider wearing latex gloves to keep your fingers clean too. 3. nickels Roll Searchers
Joe's right, but your more likely to find an indian head cent in a box of pennies than you would be to find a barber dime or a barber quarter in a box of dimes or quarters, so if your looking to find late 19th century, early 20th century coinage in rolls of coins, I'd suggest roll searching pennies. In my opinion, pennies are the most fun to roll search because there is still so much in circulation that is worth saving compared to the other denominations. (i.e. pre-82 copper pennies since a roll of pre-82 copper currently has a melt value of 98.95 cents, which is almost double it's face value. Personally, I'm surprised they're not disappearing from circulation faster than they currently are given the percentage above their face value that the melt value is.) Today's market for copper pennies kinda reminds me of the silver market 10 years ago when silver was $3 to $4 per ounce and nobody was buying it. Sorry if I got alittle off topic, but I feel that the copper pennies are today what the pre-64 silver coinage was in the 70's (i.e. people are dumping their pre-82 copper pennies at face value because of the recession today just like people were buying gas with pre-64 silver coinage in the 70's because of the shortage and pre-64 silver coinage was all that was accepted by the only gas stations that had any gas left). Again, sorry if I got alittle off topic, but I feel it ties in well with the reason I feel it's best to roll search pennies above any other denomination.
In case you don't already know of this web site and in addendum to Coinman_Ben's post, check out: Coinflation
Yeah, I didn't even mention dimes or quarters in my post, because even finding 2 or 3 early-60s silvers in a box is cause for celebration... Joe
