Need Help With A 1916-D Mercury Dime.

Awesome!
Looks to be ex-jewelry with the solder residue, my guess. Still, a nice looking 16-D :P

Wow! I knew it was better than VG, but VF30 is a little generous. All the same, MAJOR score for you my friend! I predict a 4 figure payout as well, as this coin is very rare in VF, damaged or otherwise.

Congratulations! Glad to see that it was authenticated and graded nicely!

1916 type dimes are harder to grade because they're higher relief which makes the wear pattern different on the obverse. Specifically, the front part of the wing wears down more, and the end of the wing wears less. Looking at the clarity of the sticks in the fasces, VF25 or VF30 seems about right. Too bad about the damage, but still a killer find!

@LTMets44: Yes, AFAIK all four die pairings for 1916-D dimes have that rotation (which is common in Mercury dimes generally). A 1916-D with substantially less or more rotation is a fake.

Slightly rotated reverses are common with Mercury dimes. I've got over 3,000 of them and I would say about 25% have rotated reverses. Some to the left and some to the right. this appears to be just one of those.
And as to keeping that coin. As I mentioned previously, try to remember the 300,000,000+ people in the USA today and growing by the second. Now with over 7,000,000,000 on Earth, again, try to remember how many may want that coin.
So your chances of finding one in the future is getting dimmer by the second also.
I wouldn't want to be a person that someday says coulda, shoulda, woulda.

Excellent!

Keep it. Fill the hole in your album. Be proud to have it!

You could definitely get quite a bit on ebay for it...$100 or $250 is way too low. Originally, I would've also advised you to get it repaired...however the high slab grade will further increase the amount you get for it as people often buy the slab, not the coin (especially on key dates) so it might not be worth it any more given that you probably won't get a VF-30 grade again. I agree with the others that VF-30 is generous...I was thinking around F-15 but the same thing has happened to me both ways (undergrading and overgrading) when submitting coins. It might look stronger in hand though, so I could be wrong.

Also note that its not the mintage that makes this coin so expensive, even though 264,000 is pretty low for a 20th century coin. The 1927-S quarter has 400,000 minted and its only $20-25 in AG condition. It's more that everyone wants to complete this set, supply and demand etc. It's also been 'famous' as a key date for a long long time. I have a few coins with less than 1/10 the mintage of a 1916-D, and they're all worth less even in higher grade save for one I think. I'd keep it in the slab and put it up for BIN or best offer at $1200, and see what offers roll in. Try to get $750 after fees out of it. I dont think ANACS has a cert lookup, by the way.