any oldsters around who remember buying dollars at the mint

[scrounger d detector collector]

i was reading an article.about how the us mint

sold many bags of silver dollars at face

just b4 silver went outta circulation.

like a giant lottery to get some rarer dates

 

[Goldmanford]

That would make since since between 1935 and 1964 there were no other dollar coins minted so if the date was 1963 and you went to a bank and requested a bag of dollar coins, all of the would be silver. I have a coin (I think Peace dollar) from my grandparents that had a piece of tape on the front and it one time was taped to an advertisement for a car dealership. I'm sure they probably bought a bag or two of dollars to promote their dealership and they would all have been SILVER.

Image going back in time!!!!

 

[Stang1968]

A bag was a lot of money, if the bags were $1000 bags. Your average Joe wouldn't be able to purchase a bag from the bank or the Gvt.
Most of the bags were purchased by coin dealers from what I've read.

 

[warsawdaddy]

I remember in the early 50's or '40's or both,you could dollars at face from the mint and you could buy as small amount as you wanted.

 

[ArkieBassMan]

A bag was a lot of money, if the bags were $1000 bags. Your average Joe wouldn't be able to purchase a bag from the bank or the Gvt.
Most of the bags were purchased by coin dealers from what I've read.

Neither could most "above average Joes". The value of the dollar itself has dropped greatly since that time. A $1000 bag then would probably be equal to $7000+ in today's money. My grandparents both went to work for the state in or about 1967. Grandpa made $1.25 an hour. Grandma received $1.05. Thats $2600 and $2184 a year respectfully...and thats before taxes. Only the wealthy had $1000+ lying around to "play" with. $1000 in the mid 1960's would pay for around half of a new automobile or even about 1/3rd of a nice little house.

Speculating on a $1000 bag of silver dollars around 1964 would be just about the same as speculating on about ~$8000 worth of clad NIFC halves today.

 

[Silver Bear]

I wasn't able to do anything like getting a bag. Had about 30 or so nice old Morgans.

Dad used to give me a dollar a week allowance. He let me choose. So I opted for silver. When he went into the old Ducktown Banking to get his check cashed and buy his weekly bond, the tellers would pick out the nicest oldest one they had for me.

Well I was bad to carry some of them around. Dad talked (or conned one) me into, yep you guessed it, into opening my own saving's account. (Mutter!) Telling me i'd lose them.

I was about 10 - 11 when they swiped our silver. There's was quite the fuss between me and that teller when I faithfully let her know i'd deposited silver and that's what I expected back. Of course to no avail

The following summer vacation I remember the principal of my school was going to Vegas. He even looked around for me. Of course that didn't help either.

A bit after that I started, for a time, buying some nice Uncirculated cartwheels in the $1.10 to $1.15 range depending on the mint mark and all that jazz.

Bless Dad he was raised during the Depression and if it wasn't a tool or related to work it was utter nonsense. He gave me the 'ol evil eye for paying the insane price noted above for a silver dollar.

Wish I could have got him to listen. HH!

Best Regards, SB

 

[jim4silver]

The US stopped making silver dollars in 1935 (not counting commemorative issues), so any dollar coins bought in 1964 would have been 30 years old by that point. But it would seem people were still used to seeing them alot and the fact they were silver probably did not really mean much to them like it would now.

I think some tend to believe that folks back in 1964 thought much about their coinage being silver, but for the most part they took it for granted. I was not around back then but everyone I have spoken to about it didn't really give it much though when they stopped making the silver coins, unfortunately. Some of the more astute saw the great potential and started hoarding right away.

One of my coin dealers told me that he has a customer whose father started hoarding back around that time and when he died, he left his son a very large amount of original unopened silver coin rolls--quarters, dimes and halves all purchased back then at face value. He didn't tell me how much exactly the son had in dollar value, but that the "collection" was huge in volume.

I have heard from another person that back in the late 70's as silver was rising in price, he was CRHing at banks and could get rolls of big dollar coins back then. He said it was very common to find decent amounts of Peace dollars and even some Morgans mixed in with the Eisenhowers, and silver halves were quite plentiful, both 90% and 40%. He said this ended as silver peaked at 50 bucks an ounce in the early 80s and people caught on to the value/price of silver.

Jim

 

[Bigheed]

those darn hunt brothers!

there was also a rash of home invasions in the 80s to steal peoples flatware and servingware that was sterling. My mom had my dad take hers to the office. He was a Secret Service Agent, it was quite secure

 

[Gilmore Happy]

those darn hunt brothers!

there was also a rash of home invasions in the 80s to steal peoples flatware and servingware that was sterling. My mom had my dad take hers to the office. He was a Secret Service Agent, it was quite secure

Can't wait to see how theft will become an issue again when silver pops once more. We would be naive to think people won't act like this again. Everything is just, cycles.

 

[jim4silver]

those darn hunt brothers!

there was also a rash of home invasions in the 80s to steal peoples flatware and servingware that was sterling. My mom had my dad take hers to the office. He was a Secret Service Agent, it was quite secure

Can't wait to see how theft will become an issue again when silver pops once more. We would be naive to think people won't act like this again. Everything is just, cycles.

Silver theft will probably be relatively minor compared to everything else, but the crooks will gladly take it if they can find it. Right now there are huge increases in the theft of various forms of metal. People are stealing sewer lids, air conditioner coils, bronze grave markers, copper from all kinds of different sources, you name it.

As the economy further corrodes more and more thievery will be taking place. Probably will see more car jackings and armed robbery as things get worse.

Jim

 

[fistfulladirt]

I was a wee one back in '64, my folks didn't care about silver coins, why should they, a quarter was a quarter back then...it wasn't until the Hunt bros came on the scene that silver went ballistic...I did a little roll hunting and I don't remember 40% halves being in demand. I was searching quarter rolls and dimes in '79. The finds were worse than today, I don't recall finding silver, but I do remember halves were still in circ and I got a '64 Kennedy in change and still have it. ffd

 

[madwest]

Buying a $1000 bag of silver coins in 1965 and sitting on them would NOT have been the most brilliant investment of the day.

For silver, you would have realized a 31x return on investment over a period of 46 years. That rate of return is less than 7.5% - ok, but not stellar.

Hiding $1000 of gold at face in 1932 wouldn't either. That rate of return is less than 6%.

Investing in the S&P 500 from 1957 (when the S&P was created) would have returned an average of nearly 11% (Unless you got out in 2007. Then it would have been 21%.)