Let the coins come to you. Let me show you how.

[Silver Fox]

Earlier this year I "came out" of retirement in metal detecting. I went out only a couple of times and my last trip produced an 0.8 ounce 14KT "bling" of a kneeling jesus carrying a cross. So I ended the year (very early!) with a nice gift. But, at heart I'm a 24-hour arm-chair (a sofa, really) treasure hunter always entertaining thoughts of making nice finds. I found a way of acquiring coins without leaving my building!

Every year, around this time, a shareholder's kid puts a box on the mailboxes' ledge asking for people to donate their cents. The kid eventually accumulates a lot of cents, rolls them, and donates them to one or more charities through the New York City school system as indicated in the photo. As the coins accumulate I search through them looking for wheats. When I find them I replace them with modern clad cents.

What's great about this, though, is that sometimes people empty their pockets putting in the box other coins such as quarters, dimes, nickels. As we all know, some people don't look closely at their coins and may walk around with silver dimes and quarters and war nickels. So far, all I've found is 7 wheats dating from 1936 to the '50s. And they're clean!

So, using your imagination you could probably come up with a similar project using your kids as "bait", knowing full well that it's a good deed and you're not ripping off anyone, you're just being "crafty."

Below are a couple of photos of the way the kid in my building does it. Whatta ya think?

Silver Fox

 

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[BuckleBoy]

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[liftloop]

It's good to here from you silver fox, thats a cool idea.

 

[I_Dig_NYC]

Always good to hear from you Silver Fox. We have some things in common besides being New Yorkers I too have become more of an armchair TH'er unable to find the time, perfect weather and/or motivation to go MD'ing as much as I would like to. Yes many times I have stared at those donation boxes wondering about what treasure may be in there, at times more than willing to exchange my cash for those coins and the chance to search through them. Instead I have opted for coin roll hunting, as I'm sure you know what that is. Basically whenever the mood or curiosity strikes me to search through coins I simply take $25 to the bank and ask for a box of pennies. I have found many Wheaties and Canadians that way and surprisingly have found many dimes mixed in the rolls with the pennies. Lets just say that I not only have tons of fun doing this but I also break even and even turn a tiny profit doing this, if you factor in the value of the wheaties and the dimes. All the losers get returned to the bank and exchanged for cash and the process starts over again. I have had lots of luck this way by buying out all the penny rolls at the local delis and grocery stores. Anyway enough about coin roll hunting I don't mean to change the topic, it's just that this post reminded me of that.

What really got me thinking after reading this and seeing that box of "money", and of course being a New Yorker, I thought there must be some very honest people where you live. I'm not sure there are many places you could leave a box of coins in the open, not chained or bolted down, and expect them to be there in the morning, LOL. With that being said are you ever worried that someone may come along and see you digging through it and get the wrong impression of what you are doing? Anyway just making conversation here.

Harry...

 

[Peerless67]

"ITS PENNY HARVEST TIME"

Time to harvest the wheat

 

[Silver Fox]

Always good to hear from you Silver Fox. We have some things in common besides being New Yorkers I too have become more of an armchair TH'er unable to find the time, perfect weather and/or motivation to go MD'ing as much as I would like to. Yes many times I have stared at those donation boxes wondering about what treasure may be in there, at times more than willing to exchange my cash for those coins and the chance to search through them. Instead I have opted for coin roll hunting, as I'm sure you know what that is. Basically whenever the mood or curiosity strikes me to search through coins I simply take $25 to the bank and ask for a box of pennies. I have found many Wheaties and Canadians that way and surprisingly have found many dimes mixed in the rolls with the pennies. Lets just say that I not only have tons of fun doing this but I also break even and even turn a tiny profit doing this, if you factor in the value of the wheaties and the dimes. All the losers get returned to the bank and exchanged for cash and the process starts over again. I have had lots of luck this way by buying out all the penny rolls at the local delis and grocery stores. Anyway enough about coin roll hunting I don't mean to change the topic, it's just that this post reminded me of that.

What really got me thinking after reading this and seeing that box of "money", and of course being a New Yorker, I thought there must be some very honest people where you live. I'm not sure there are many places you could leave a box of coins in the open, not chained or bolted down, and expect them to be there in the morning, LOL. With that being said are you ever worried that someone may come along and see you digging through it and get the wrong impression of what you are doing? Anyway just making conversation here.

Harry...

Hi I_Dig: The mailboxes are in our expansive, marbled lobby. The building is a co-op in which I have lived since 1972 (except for 9 years in L.A. but I kept the lease on the apartment) so every tenant and shareholder knows me, a most honest person. Anyone that sees me rifling through the coins either doesn't care or if they're curious and ask me I tell them the truth, I'm looking for wheats and replace each one found with a modern cent. Besides, we recently had a security system installed and there's a camera aimed at the mailboxes section.

Some of my neighbors have seen me girded for metal detecting so they know of my association with coins. Being a scavenger, sometimes I find old purses thrown out and I look through them. I've found a couple of silver dimes, a Roos and a Liberty Head.

Finally, in the early '90s I got a rold of halves from the bank and the roll contained Walking Liberties and Franklins. 20 of them! I wrote an article about it and it was published in Treasure Facts (Lost Treasure offshoot).

Goood talking to you.

Silver Fox

 

[Ricardo_NY1]

I've never coin roll hunted as Harry mentions, but I have developed the following metal detectorless habits since I got into metal detecting........

I actually look at my change........I've found at least 15 wheats and a silver war nickel so far in the past two years.

I cannot keep my eyes off the collection boxes at McDonald's. As they keep me waiting there forever on an Angus Burger (49 sec average serving time my a&^).......I glance at the coins from various angles looking for that edge.

I pay with a one dollar bill as opposed to exact change on everything to keep that change coming!

Cool post Silver Fox!

 

[Silver Fox]

I've never coin roll hunted as Harry mentions, but I have developed the following metal detectorless habits since I got into metal detecting........

I actually look at my change........I've found at least 15 wheats and a silver war nickel so far in the past two years.

I cannot keep my eyes off the collection boxes at McDonald's. As they keep me waiting there forever on an Angus Burger (49 sec average serving time my a&^).......I glance at the coins from various angles looking for that edge.

I pay with a one dollar bill as opposed to exact change on everything to keep that change coming!

Cool post Silver Fox!

Here's another one, Ricardo (and everyone else that can benefit from the conditions necessary). After every heavy rain, sometimes during, I don my long, waterproof boots and take a walk in Central Park concentrating on hills, small and large, and some muddy areas near the lake. I have found clad coins, silver quarters, dimes, jewelry mostly on the hills that have bare ground. The heavy rain (the heavier, the better) erodes the surface somewhat revealing shallow coins. Once, to my total surprise, I pulled out a Walker half when I saw just the edge and I thought it was a quarter. What a beauty!

Here's the best one. Once again, after a heavy rain, I scanned the short steep shoulders of the West Drive around 60-something street and saw the top of a bottle sticking out. I grabbed it, thinking that I was going to pull out just the top and the neck and, lo and behold, I pulled out an octagonal (or maybe six-sided, can't remember now) 1848 soda bottle, a beautiful blue. I took it home, cleaned it and researched it. Eventually, I sold it for over $100 to a local bottle collector who also digs for them in private properties.

Any park, with hills or steep surfaces will provide something without digging. Just keep your eye open and watch your step, those wet, muddy hillsides are slippery!

Silver Fox

 

[I_Dig_NYC]

Silver Fox and Ricardo_NY1, good ideas, I am afraid I have already been doing those exact things. Great minds think alike right. I too always, and I mean ALWAYS scan or actually stare at my change especially if a coin looks a little funny it gets extra attention from me, people probably think I'm weird when they see me staring at an old nickel right. But I also have found many wheats and several silver war nickels as well as 1 silver Rosie that way, I love it....
The erroded hillsides is also a great way to find them without digging. I found a few wheaties right on the surface of those erroded hills especially around one particular tree. The wheaties were from the teens, pretty old. Haven't found big silver or gold jewelry yet but I take what I can find and I am happy. Oh yes and those McDonalds charity boxes make me drool as well LOL..