They would be Silver Eagles....and you are close they are 99.93% pure. Depending on the year of issue they could be quite valuable.
Well Wheat Pennies, Buffalo Nickels and Mercury Dimes were all still being minted when I was born - as were silver Washington quarters, silver Walking Liberty Half Dollars - I'm fairly old so maybe you are too.
I got $50 bags of loose pennies from the bank in the sixties and sorted through them for specific dates. I made a lot of money picking out any one that was worth more than a penny wholesale. - I'd hold them until I had a bunch of rolls then take them to a dealer. I also found individual coins worth up to $175 (then year dollars) and bunches worth a dollar or two.I still pull them out of circulation from time to time.
I remember about 30 years ago or so, I worked with this nerdy sort (not that I'm not...) who said that for fun him and his father would go to the bank and get a bunch of pennies, then sit there watching TV sorting them for the wheat pennies. At the time, there were still quite a few in circulation, but they were selling in bulk from dealers for $ .02 apiece. Their theory was they were going to at least double their money.
True, but I wonder what they ended up making as an hourly rate.... probably about as much as a pen turner...
-gary
ps - I was just telling my wife the other day that I *hate* the back on the new penny. Really ugly, whereas the Lincoln Memorial was just classy.
They also changed nickels to have 40% (maybe 35%) silver from mid 1942 thru 1945 because nickel was in short supply and needed. One Cent Coins were also struck in 1944 from recycled brass recovered from artillery shells and it had a little different composition than the usual copper cents.
Most silver coins struck by the US Mint have no more than 90% silver. Those intended for circulation would wear out too fast if it was more than that.Hmm .... went back to look at my coins, as I was sure at least one of them said 99.999% pure, Macedonian Grade, 1 Troy Oz.
I was right, it did say that .... but it's not a US coin, lol. It's a pure silver 1 oz mint bar. I got some of these in some carnival games as a kid ... they were worth about 5 bucks each back then. They're sitting next to my walking liberty coins, so I got em kinda mixed up in my head.
I'm still in the middle of making stands for some of them, for display... I'll have to come back with some pics when they're done.
Life takes strange paths - when I was a child, virtually the only way you could spend money in most stores was cash. They would not even accept checks unless they knew you very well. This was pretty much the way things were until I was an adult. Most mom and pop grocery stores would give regular customers credit. They would keep track with a receipt book with the customer's name on it.
Guess you wouldn't take 5 Hamiltons for a Grant then either....
Tons of the 1943 zinc pennies have been replated....originals still in pristine condition are worth a bit more. The pennies in 1944/45 were made from recycled brass from artillery shells and had a sligtly different formula than normal. Something similar happened for some years in the 80s when the copper content was reduced a bit. I did own a 1909S vdb which I had to buy (it was the only cent that I bought in my collection, I stopped collecting about 1970 and sold my colledtions a few years later.
That would be 1922 plain ... which btw is a mint error just like the double dies etc. All 1922 cents were struck at the Denver mint, some the mint mark took poorly and some it really didn't take at all.
I think that was the first mint error to be included in the general collections---as I recall in my set which I started in 1962 and had for around 15 years only that and the 1955 double strike error were included in the "general" collection. One of my early Lincoln cents was a 1913 that was struck on an incorrect platen and was more of a brass color than the normal copper.
