Always be nice and polite at your lcs. My shop currently has 90% silver at 19.25 x face. My guy will pick the mercury dimes out for me. I’ve been told that I’m the only one he will do that for. I can’t stand to see a mercury dime melted so these are a couple of the ones I saved today. Not bad for $1.92 ea. I’ve found everyone but the 16d and the 21’s.
I usually buy $5 face at a time. Love looking through the roll in hopes of a good find. One day I will find a 16d.
In the past I'd buy an average of a Mercury bag/month, through LCS, and sell the unwanted significant coins back to Hannes Tulving, Jr.. That all ended when dealers were getting investigated for money laundering, the State confiscated the Silver dealers/my inventory for not collecting state tax on sales, and Hannes went on a 3 year Federal vacation. I loved those days, but never found a 1916D, which I had to buy retail. It was amazing how many AU/MS coins were found in 30's-40's, but the coin never established the popularity of the common full-Liberty Barber dimes.
One day I will find a 16d. I’m on the west coast. Lots of Denver coins here. Best I have found so far are several 45 micro s and 26 s dimes
I believe you'll find, if you research, that 1945 was the only year where THREE different eses (Ss) were struck on the coin. A 1945 micro-s with full fasces (one of the sticks, 2nd from right below center band, is notorious for incomplete strike: https://www.ebay.com/itm/1932921195...MI1Zyn8YXC-wIVRfvjBx3JAg3hEAQYAyABEgI0Y_D_BwE) sticks and sharp diagonal bands is quite valuable, but I've found to be generally unknown. I acquired the combination with all 3 eses, in my 70+ years of searching! I argued/discussed the aforementioned unknown anomaly with collectors until eventually acquiring a holder with all 3 coin samples. Just "food for thought" in your collecting.
Hope you're staring really hard at the date on each and every 1942-D you find, looking for the just-subtle-enough-to-miss 1942/1-D overdate...
In my experience, it's pretty easy to spot, ESPECIALLY when it isn't actually present. If I had a 1942/1-D for every time I thought I'd spotted a 1942/1-D...
I became aware of the rarity of the 1945 P Full Split Bands and haunted e-bay for quite awhile looking for one. I bought a PCGS MS65 that looked as much like FSB as the one you mention above. I bought it for $35 and re-submitted it in hopes of getting the FSB designation, but it came back as an MS66.
Doing business with the same LCS definitely builds trust, I have been with mine for 15 plus years and always gives me a call when a specific year krugerrand with no up charge
I, like you, have been going to my lcs for many years. They know what I like. They always come down on price without me asking. Usually just $5 or so.
I have a local gold and silver store. When they first started out they had a lot of vintage hard to find silver Art bars. I'd pursue the selection and set some aside and say let me go hit up a bank...I'll be right back for these Everyone now and again I'd spot something that was just off and mention that they might want to check that one out further. I bought 90% by weight rather than XX face, but Over time the selection got thinner and thinner. I got some good deals there as they weren't interested in vintage just weight. Now it's all new generic stuff.