Hi All, I am still in the midst of going through my second penny box and have already found alot to keep, but I will wait to post what I found till I'm done. I did find though two 1969S and one 1972S thus far. They are in decent condition but is it worth keeping any S mint marks? I mean I have gone through 32 rolls and found only these 3 but I dont want to waste time and coin album space if not necessary. Thank you. JH
Sixteen hundred coins and you found just three S-mintmarked cents? Very nice. Keep on diggin' and save everyone you find! I have for over 44 years. S-mintmarked Lincoln Memorial cents only exist from circulation for the years 1968-1974. Always a nice modern find!
I have been keeping them since I was a kid. I save them whenever I find them in CRH. The most difficult date to find is the 1973 for some reason. The '68 has the lowest circulation mintage of the whole Memorial series.
1968 - 258,270,001 1969 - 544,375,000 1970 - 690,560,004 1971 - 525,133,459 1972 - 376,939,108 1973 - 317,177,295 1974 - 409,426,660 Do you really think it's worth saving all but the best specimens? Chris
I keep them as well. I've gone through about $1500 in cents and have pulled less than $1.50 in "S" mints. I've thrown a couple really nasty ones back into the mix but I keep 99% of them.
I think you might as well pull all the copper cents while you're at it. The circulated S mints won't be worth more than the copper it's made of, in my opinion.
Indeed, those mintage numbers are high. Nonetheless, there has always been a special mystique about collecting San Francisco's coinage. Sometimes, it is just, as Sheldon entitled his large cent book, "penny whimsy." S-mintmarked coins are fun to find! Isn't that what much of collecting coins is supposed to be about?
drop the 82s, falls flat, throw it back, if it rings, you are king! im not kiding, about half of the 82s were copper.
I'm going to guess and say I've gone through $400 in pennies. I have a half a roll of memorials from SF and of that I've only found one from 68.
Always save the S is a good rule to live by. Also keep your eyes open for the rare 1969-S variety. Proof only cents started in 1975 so if you find any S marks after then they are proof coins and should be kept.
I got a small jar that's full of pre 1982 ones. I only kept ones without any obvious blue verdigris. At one time I was keeping more but it fell out of interest for me. I never thought about s mints but the pops are too large for me. I think older Jefferson nickels are a better bet if you're looking for some collector value
