Lincoln Cents - 1909 To 1940 - How To Complete

Personally I think the Lincolns are a terrible set for a newbie, especially a youngster to start with. Sure you can roll search and get the memorials without too much trouble, although the circulation S mints may be a small challenge, but then what? The obvious desire would then be to try and go back and chase the rest of the Lincolns and he then finds it impossible to do from circulation or even roll searching. Sure they can go to a dealer and get the 41 - 58 cents pretty easily but then they are stuck. Sure they can buy a bunch of the common 09 - 40 cents but they will quickly realize that they will never be able to complete the set.

A much better starting collection are the Jefferson nickels. Back to 1960 are pretty easy from circulation and roll searching will allow you to eventually get most of the entire series for face value. And if they do have to buy coins they can't find they are ALL affordable (Unless you insist on MS-65 or full step coins) Roosevelt dimes are a good choice, except the clads will be too easy and all of the pre clad coins will have to be purchased, but at least the pre-clads are cheap and they are silver.

well over at coin roll hunting at treasure net... they get a lot better than 4-5 a box. I get around 8-10 when I roll search. So 2500/8 is around 333 or 2500/10 is around 250. I mean you can't take one person from one area and make it the "average". Also, box of cents are just 2500 not 5000 coins, so you math of one per 1500 would be like 1.5 a box.

http://www.cheapgreenandhappy.blogspot.com/ has a 0.63% wheat (that is one per 158 cents) % over 1.1 million cents searched. (I am assuming you haven't search 1.1 million cents and tracked the results) I think that is a little more useful than one person searching a box and finding just 3-4 than making it the normal for everyone. Yet his silver dime % is .1% or almost 1 per 1000 with quarters being 1 per 5000.

There are people over there that are pretty much down to like handful of missing cents just from roll searching. I grant you that they search a lot of cents, but it is possible to get an almost complete set from change.

I do agree though that Jefferson nickel and FDR dimes are better sets to start with if finishing it cheaply is the goal.

-SWUSC

Which leads to my next post. I think if you want to collect pre-1941 Lincolns, it sounds like the options are:

1) Go through a bazillion rolls or boxes
2) Buy 'em

I bought a few rolls of wheats at the local dealer for $2 a roll to try that out but only found 3 coins I needed out of that batch - two common 1930's and a 1917-S. So, I don't think the roll route is for me.

I had been watching collections of 09-40 wheats on ebay for a few weeks. I had bought a nice collection of 41-59 in a really nice Whitman folder for under $10 a few months ago and combined with what I have ended up with a complete folder of 41-74 cents with lots of red and red-brown ones.

So, I just bought a 09-40 collection on ebay - 78 of the 89 coins. Paid a little under $50 with shipping. I estimated the coins are worth a little over $100 in G4 condition and am sure some of these are nicer. Again, my goal was to fill out the album as far as I could - maybe get 85 of the 89.

So, I am going to merge these 78 in with the ones I have and maybe will also build out a second partial 09-40 set and a partial 41-59 set and sell them to recoup some $$$. Or keep 'em - I have a hard time parting with coins once I own them.

Then, I can go the coin show and local dealer route to fill out some of the tougher slots that will remain - for example 1910-S.

The 1909-S VDB is gonna have to wait...

Ken

There is a difference between wheats from 1940-1958 and 1909-1939 The post 1940 are way easier to find (well not the steel ones). I would say the pre 1940 are maybe 1 per box or 2 per 3 boxes or something like that.

I have all the common's, but the best way to do it from a start is buy a few rolls from ebay or a dealer and a $50.00 wheat bag on ebay.

You sort by date pull the best ones of each date/mint mark, then re bag 5000 wheat and resell them. I doubt you get a lot of semi keys or keys :), but at least you are getting at least decent XF (hopefully) of all the commons. It will limit the need to upgrade later on.

I found my 1909 that is in my dansco out of a roll (that box also had a 1900 cent too).

The 1954 P wheat is a beast to find in the wild too, but I think I found all the post 40s in the wild expect the 1943s.

-SWUSC

I built my Lincoln wheat set very late in my collecting life. My early collecting was all silver coinage because(I believe)I lived through the era of the removal of silver from business strike issues.
I bought the keys first; 09 S VDB, 09 S, 14 D and the 31 S. Then I began buying partial sets; they usually were missing 7 to 12 coins, but some had semi keys included. I bought about 5 sets in all and cherry picked the best coins into a set number "one". I then reassembeled 2 sets and sold them as starters; the remaining cull coins were sold in small lots or individually. I recovered about 70 percent of the cost of the partial sets; it seems that the value in the market place for the "whole" is less than the sum of the "parts".
The last and still ongoing step is to upgrade individual coins according to your goals for consistent grades or appearance.
This my not appeal to everyone but it was fun, much less expensive and certainly less time consuming than other methods.
Regards,
afernbaugh

Well, I received my set tonight in the mail and overall, I have to say I am pleased. I upgraded many of the coins I already had and now have a set of 79/89 09-40 Lincolns.

Some of the better dates I got in this set - 1909 VDB, 1911-D, 1912-D, 1912-S and 1922-D.

Okie, you may be right about that 1909-S VDB although I can't see pressing a $1000 coin into an album with my thumb! But I am already plotting on how to fill the teens D and S slots that are currently open.

Ken

If you have small local auctions, give them a try.. Sometimes they are auctioning a whole house full of stuff and odd coins go cheap.