Why Is A 1914 D Lincoln More Than A 1931 S Lincoln?

Lets roll back the clock and hoard a few rolls. I am shopping for a 1914-d cent and cannot believe the high sums for even the lowest quality coins.

I am in the process of buying a house built in 1914. Maybe they stashed some rolls in the walls for me to find behind the horsehair plaster...

Some of you guys are missing what ''Connor'' said. he said the 31-S'S were hoarded by the roll. Not the 14-D's .

When I worked construction I used to hide newspapers and coins from the year we built the house that they would find when they took down those walls, or tore down the building years later. If somebody did that in 1914 though, it doesn't matter if they were being horded by collectors or not. :)

The '31-S is an important coin because it helped shape coin collecting.

There was very little demand for coin in 1931 in San Francisco because of the depression and these coins still sat in a vault early in 1932. An enterprising dealer realized that the entire mintage could be had for a little more than $10,000 so he offered to buy the coins. The mint was highly insulted that they'd make the coins and then they'd only go to coin collectors so they not only refused to sell them but they changed their policy to never issue very low mintages again. This has no doubt affected the way collectors have migrated to high grades and varieties seeking rarity.

The '31-S got some public attention during this and the original would be buyer ended up with quite a few of the coins. Indeed there may have been as few as twenty individuals who got nearly half the mintage while many of the other half were also set aside a roll here and a roll there.

Almost the entire '14-D mintage went straight into circulation and had about a 2% annual attrition until the mid-'30's when people started putting worn specimens into the new fangled coin boards.

It does seem as if most 31s a re still in very high grade. Never heard that story about the coin collector and the mint.

A fella came in off the street to the annual coin show in Spartanburg South Carolina this past Saturday looking to sell a nice circulated roll of 31-s Lincolns. The first guy offered him $50/coin; a second dealer offered $58/coin. The man seemed insulted and left the show.

Imagine buying a whole mint year. Lots of good information.