Finding Rare Coins In Circulation!

Found a 1885 Indian cent in a roll of cents around mid 90's, later had it grade by NGC as a MS-64 Brown.

Wow, carl, I loved this post. Hearing how you used silver dollars as spending money without a second thought! That's really cool. Yup, I can understand that all those other type designs still in circulation were no big deal--after all, that was the normal for that time.

Did you really find a 1909-SVDB in circulation?

bpoc, the 1992 CAM that was found by a member here in 2011 was sold in 2014 for $4,494.00, and that one was in a PCGS Genuine slab with no grade attributed.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1311631022...ue#itemTitle

Actually several of them. Same with 14D, 22 plain, etc. And that is why I have 10 1916D Mercury dimes. Remember those were just coins back then. 1909S VDB was just a penny. Way back then my Dad gave me Silver Dollars for an allowance. Once old enough to get there, I spent all of them at a place called Riverview. It was an amusement park, now gone. I remember myself and a friend spending time erasing the D on some 1922 Cents for fun. Sure looked funny when the Mint started making pennies out of steel back then.

carl, by the early 60's all the good cents, and all the Indian Heads, were pretty much out of circulation. My milk money often contained a 1917 or 1919-P, but nothing with a mintmark. As far as dimes, it was common 40's Mercurys, and fairly easy to complete a set of Roosevelts. The 38 and 39 D&S nickels turned up from time to time. All the grungy looking silver nickels were common, since silver wasn't at a premium. Never found a 1950-D nickel though, nor a 1955-S cent.

Couldn't find a thread and didn't want to start a new one.

After 3+ years I finally found a 2009D dime! Book full!

Carl's right. When is a big factor. Growing up in the 60s in the San Francisco Bay area I was able to semi complete 4 whitman folders for the LWC. I only found one 09s Vdb, and that was in fair condition. I found 1 09S. The other years were not too difficult but not too easy either, except for the 10S of which I had 13. Believe it or not the one coin that was hard to find was the 33D. I never found one in circulation. Strangely I think we get more calls from collectors for that coin than the keys. Partially, I guess, because it is more affordable than a 14D. Yet still a difficult coin to come accross. Buffalo's were still around, though as someone said, about half were dateless I was able to collect a full set of all the S mints. Silver dollars were no big deal. The still had millions of them in Reno and Tahoo. Indian Head cents were pretty much gone. My notebook has 1 in it. Mercs were still common up till about 66; more or less. I was able to get about 3 sets semi complete minus the 16d and 21 and 21D. Though I did have a 21D that I found in circulation.

To make this short the rarest coin I found in circulation in the 1960s was a 1913-S type 2 Buffalo, which is probably a solid "good". A close second would be the 21-S buffalo I found in XF45.