1998-P Souvenir Uncirculated Mint Set

I can't get a mintage for you but these were surprisingly high mintage. I've never seen one but I'm told these later dates had a lot of Gems and PL's in them. These were never very popular and began in 1972 with a mintage of 400 but there are persistent rumors that the '71 exists. The '82 and '83 were available mail order because there were no mint sets that year but mintages still only got up to 10,000 to 20,000 with the '82-P being lowest and both Denvers being highest. The '83-P was reported at 15,000.

The sets suddenly enjoyed great popularity in 1987 when it was announced that half dollars wouldn't be made for circulatiuon and the mint set wasn't ready yet. There was heavy speculation in these briefly but now they are simply common.

The 1998 was the last year of issue because the mint said they had their hands full with the states quarters and the logistics of adding these to the sets were too complex.

These sets are all very underappreciated. Attrition is simply staggering and mintages were generally low.

Yes.

Up until 1987 these were definitely normal press runs but after this I don't know. Mint set coins are stuck with new dies under higher pressure on old style presses but the souvenir set coins were just nicer coins from regular press runs. There are not a lot of Gems in these sets and no varieties at all except the 3 coin SBA set of 1979 sometimes has the near date.

Most were sold only in the gift shops but some later dates were sold at the BEP kiosk in Washington DC and the '82/ '83 sets were availabler mail order but the numismatic press failed to report this. Very few mainstrean newspapers picked it up so very few were sold.

The numismatic press has never been very favorable to moderns except the rare story to promote them interspersed with massive bad press and misleading pricing.

this is the 1982 p & d



looking , can not find the 98p set.

To me it looks like a scam. I am not aware of a 'special' mint set in 1998. They had regular mint sets. That cover looks like a 1982/83 packaging with 1998 coins.
It looks weird that the packaging shape (shape of the space the coins sit in) is exactly the same as the 82/83 but it has the more modern blue strip for Philadelphia.

If I'm wrong let me know. Something just doesn't feel right

But I have never heard of the 1998 set though.