Coin roll hunting has goal collectible coin
Coin roll hunting in the United States
In the United States, coin roll hunters obtain rolls of cents, nickels, dimes, quarters, halves, and sometimes small and large dollar coins, most commonly through withdrawing an amount of money from a bank account in the denomination desired.
Prime targets of American coin roll hunters are silver dimes, quarters, and halves prior to 1965, and 40% silver half dollars from 1965–1970. Nickels are searched for 35% silver "war nickels" (1942–1945 with mint marks on top of the Monticello on the reverse). Older discontinued designs such as the Buffalo and Liberty ("V") nickels are also collected. Cents are also searched for older designs such as copper wheat cents (1909–1958, made out of zinc plated steel in 1943), Indian head cents (1859–1909), and errors and varieties such as doubled dies and close and wide “AM” cents. Some searchers also save copper memorial Lincoln cents (1959–1982) for their growing value as copper bullion. Toned coins are also of interest to collectors, and are occasionally found in coin rolls, particularly on the ends of old bank-wrapped coin rolls. An occasional darkly discolored or corroded nickel, dime, quarter, or half dollar can fool the collector by its edge, giving off the appearance of a silver coin. Often coin roll hunters also collect special proof coins, tokens and other exonumia, and foreign coins. Others attempt to find and complete a set of coins, like the America the Beautiful Quarters, 50 State Quarters, Presidential Dollars, or even every year and mint of regular designs. Other special issues collected by some include the bicentennial quarters and halves (1976), bicentennial Lewis and Clark nickels (2004–2005), and the lower mintage bicentennial Lincoln cents (2009). Specific dates of specific denominations that are rarer than others or minted in lower-than-usual quantities may also be taken from circulation, such as 1970, 1987, or 2002 to present halves, 2009 nickels and dimes, or 2002–2008 Sacagawea dollars. Coins of low mintage are known as “semi-key dates”, while coins of very low mintage are known as “key dates”. Some famous key date coins include the 1909 S VDB wheat cent, the 1950 D Jefferson nickel, and the 1916 D Mercury dime. People search the rolls for error coins that have defects from the minting process, such as the aforementioned doubled dies, coins struck with wrong planchets, and coins struck off center, etc. These coins can be worth more than face value to collectors, with some such as the 1955 doubled die cent potentially being worth thousands of dollars.