A friend gave me two sets of Walking Liberty half dollars packaged in what appear to be AirTite capsules in a paper folder labeled "Publisher's Clearinghouse Collectibles" as shown in the pictures. It's a little hard to tell in the picture, but they are about VG grade and look like they've been cleaned and polished. Does anyone know about this program, e.g. when it was available and wheter it was part of their usual promotional sweepstakes, or were they actually selling coins?
No, I'm sure this was from a long time ago, but I don't know how long I'm just curious about the history of it and what they sold these for. I thought Publisher's Clearinghouse sold magazine subscriptions. I didn't know they sold collectibles.
Maybe thats how they used to pay the winners of the sweepstakes 2 million half dollars. On a serious note, many companies like this one, QVC and Home Shopping are notorious for cleaning the coins and selling them for way over the amount they are really worth.
Publishers clearing house is best known for selling magazines, but I believe they do sell other things as well. Yep they sure do see here http://www.pch.com/products/ About two thirds of the way down the page they hav a slabbed 1921 Morgan dollar (no pictures and thy don't say who slabbed it) in MS-60 for $70 and two spots below that they have a 1928 silver certificate in unknown condition for $90. You want a raw 1964 quarter for only $35, or a raw 1963 franklin half for $52? They have them!
Amazing! They don't even show pictures of what they are selling. My favorite is "THREE RARE COINS" for $15.96. Perhaps, the next time I'm in a restaurant, I'll order "FOOD".