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 Replies: 19 / Views: 1,453 |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
997 Posts |
Around 10 years ago I would frequent a small local coin shop in the mall near my (then) home. The guy who ran it had a nest set up at the back of the store with his laptop, file cabinet etc. He always had 5-gallon paint buckets laid out on a shelf. I would see him dig a handful of pennies from Bucket #1 and quickly date-check them. From what I could see they were all Wheat pennies. Most ended up in Bucket #2 but occasionally he would toss one in a smaller Bucket #3. He worked quickly, I suspect he knew full well what dates to look for and had value above that as a cull. Other times I saw him there he would pour pennies from Bucket #2 into an odd dish on a scale. When it reached the right weight he would slip a paper penny roll on a nipple on the dish. He would then reach in and snag one or two of the pennies out and toss them back into Bucket #2 and snag a couple pennies from a separate dish ("Bucket #4"). I suspect these were the prize pennies that kept the "unsearched rolls" "special". Eventually I saw him on his laptop on ebay. With a little research I found his ebay Store and sure enough he was selling "Unsearched Rolls" of pennies and nickels. I always meant to ask him about that, but he wasn't the talkative type. Eventually I moved across the country and a few years later I wandered thru the mall and the coin shop was gone, replaced by a Russian kitsch shop. I don't know where he sourced his stocks of pennies but he always had bucketfuls of them. The buckets I saw were always full of old and dark appearing pennies, no shiny new ones. I never saw him sorting thru nickels but he did sell a bunch on ebay. His ads always mentioned something like "At least one Indian penny in every roll" or "At least 2 pennies from before 1939 in each roll". I suspect these came from the disk I called Bucket #4. I would not be surprised if there were some junk silver dimes in that dish as well. |
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
94367 Posts |
Unsearched, but at least one Indian penney in every roll?  |
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Bedrock of the Community
 United States
24984 Posts |
That reminds me of the auctions of "unsearched Wheat penny rolls" with something else on each end. How do they know?   Inordinately fascinated by bits of metal with strange markings and figures
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
94367 Posts |
Most if not all of these offers are scams, posted by people who want to cheat you. They have set out to deliberately cheat you.
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
5239 Posts |
They were 95% unsearched.
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
24984 Posts |
Quote:
They were 95% unsearched. Correct, oriole. 95% of each coin was unsearched - only the 5% around the date was searched. Inordinately fascinated by bits of metal with strange markings and figures
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Moderator
United States
94932 Posts |
Sounds about right.. (unsearched, my left foot)
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Valued Member
United States
78 Posts |
Quote: That reminds me of the auctions of "unsearched Wheat penny rolls" with something else on each end. Hondo Boguss I saw some of those on Etsy this week. "Unsearched" Wheat penny rolls with a Mercury dime on the end from an "estate sale"... I mean, I guess there's a sucker born every day but jeez, I'd feel bad ripping people off. |
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
94367 Posts |
You might feel bad, but not the thousands of scammers who use ebay everyday to rip people off. The platform is an open invitation to cheat and steal. |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
6464 Posts |
I always find myself wondering about the buyer side of the equation. It seems like a sucker would be converted into a cynic yhe first time they get burned. Where does this limitless supply of suckers come from?
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Pillar of the Community
United States
2200 Posts |
Sounds like "unsearched" really means "they were searched a few years ago but not recently."
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
19126 Posts |
There was one seller on ebay years ago who deliberately/openly created Wheat cent rolls by hand--cent by cent. The difference here is that the seller was very up front with the method used to fill the rolls. The description was straight forward--wheat cent rolls filled from the sellers hoard. I recall that the rolls were offered at auction, with a starting price of $0.01. I picked up a roll--paid something like $8.25 for it--just for fun. Coins were mostly common wheats--nothing above VF, but there was a '21 S and a '23 S --both problem free-- that served as decent hole fillers at the time. And a strong, problem free VF '43 D with a rather nice die crack. I suspect most roll sellers are somewhat dubious, but perhaps not all. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
4036 Posts |
There are quite a few folks in my local coin club that really go for the unsearched Cent rolls. One of them commented that they sell for prices all over the map, but the coins always seem to correlate in quality with the selling price. She got one roll for the "low price" of $25, and it only had random dated, well-circulated coins. Another one went for $125 (she considered it a normal price) and it had a cull silver dime and some Indian cents. Yet another went for much more (she would not disclose the price) and it had a cull Au Dollar in it. In the end she was happy with all of them, and continues to buy them to this day. My theory is that the seller makes up the roll according to the selling price, to make sure the buyer ends up happy, and to ensure he does not "waste" the better cull coins on the low-price rolls. Contact me for photographic equipment or visit my home page at: http://macrocoins.com |
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
94367 Posts |
$125 for a roll with a cull silver dime and some Indian cents, and she considers this a "normal" price and keeps on buying?   |
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Bedrock of the Community
United States
19126 Posts |
I'm wondering... Might be interesting to conduct a 'test' of single rolls of wheat cents acquired via ebay. Perhaps identify several established sellers with 99.9% or better feedback. Purchase a single roll from each seller, then inventory and evaluate--in detail--what is found in each roll. Rolls would be mixed content, not offered as straight-date bank wrapped rolls. Record and share the results. Would be fun to learn if every roll is less-than-desirable jetsam put together by a greasy fast-buck scammer, or if there's some range/variability in quality/value. Maybe something in between, on average. I might give this a try later this spring or early summer. Stay tuned... Edited by ijn1944
04/08/2024 5:15 pm
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Pillar of the Community
United States
6464 Posts |
Quote:
Yet another went for much more (she would not disclose the price) and it had a cull Au Dollar in it. When my sister's kids were little, we would take them to the local rock and mineral show. There was a guy with a trailer that held a "mining" sluice with running water. For varying amounts of money, you could buy a bag of sand and treasure stones. The kids would get a colander and whoosh it around in the water trough until they found the treasures. For the $20 high-end bag, you were guaranteed at least one "gemstone"—something like an amethyst, cloudy emerald, or whatever. Rigging Wheat cent rolls at various price levels reminds me of that. |
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Replies: 19 / Views: 1,453 |
Posted 03/31/2024 7:54 pm
