Anybody know about the Treasury sorting silver coins out of circulation back in the late 60's?

CaptHenway

I seem to remember reading decades ago about either the U.S. Mint or the U.S. Treasury or (more likely) the Federal Reserve Banks running incoming dimes, quarters and halves through special machines to sort out the 90% silver coins before recirculating the clad coins. Does anybody know anything about this? Any citations mentioning when and where this was done and for how long? For some reason I am having trouble finding stories posted on the Internet in the 1960's..........

Thanks.

jmski52

I want to remember that, but I don't recall anything specific. I don't recall anything official ever being announced. I know that the public was pulling silver coins out of circulation on a regular basis over time, but at first (1965-1967 or so) it was a non-issue because most of the coins were still silver.

I do remember that LBJ made a statement about silver in coinage - about the ongoing shortage of coins due to the rising price of silver (and some hoarding) and the subsequent issuance of clad coinage as a remedy - I think that the letter/memo circa 1964, has been posted here on the forum before.....

I also remember that the strategic stockpile was the focus of several Coin World articles in the 1970's, the concern being a question about how long it would last before silver prices would go to the moon. I think it was in the 1990's when the silver stockpile was declared non-essential.

I still think it's a travesty that they didn't release the 300,000 1964-D Peace Dollars and keep silver monetized.

ricko

I also had heard those stories, but never saw anything 'official' acknowledging that it was happening. Even when clad was introduced, silver coins were so plentiful that many people did not save them. That began to change about four years later (approximately). Cheers, RickO

Higashiyama

As others have said, for a while silver coins remained common. My recollection is that they went from being common to scarce quite quickly, e.g., common in early 1967, scarce by early 1968.

metalmeister

I remember that coin rolls went from paper to clear plastic for a time. The Armored truck companies were swapping out Silver for clad before they went to the bank. But still missed some. I don't know how, but you would get rolls from the bank in clear plastic and BOOM there was $ilver sprinkled right in there plain as day.

CaptHenway

OK thanks.

Bochiman

Thanks all...I was feeling old UNTIL I read this thread because it was before my time...literally

s4ny

I graduated from college in May 1968. I definitely remember going to the bank for at least a year prior to that and getting rolls of quarters and checking them for silver. Kennedy halves were hardly circulating and Franklins and Walkers were rare by 1967.

Silver dimes and quarters were still circulating along with clad versions, but increasingly uncommon.

Edited to add that I don't know what mechanism the US would have had to take back coins from banks and check them. The transportation and processing expense would have outweighed the benefit.

In Aug 1968 I was a young US Air Force officer and assigned (among other duties) as silver recovery monitor. I was on a base in GA that had 18,000 employees, and there was a lot of photography used, mostly x-rays of aircraft and parts and of course the base hospital. The silver residue was contained as sludge in 5 gallon canisters, and I was responsible for sending them to the Navy in Colts Neck, NJ. Others were responsible for sorting and recovering silver scrap.

ricko

@s4ny ....Now that is a job I did not know about....It does make sense (when volume was present), but just never thought of it. Cheers, RickO

johnny9434

I remember hearing g a out it but that's about it. I do remember some of the copper ddo's coming out then the government said we don't make mistakes. Yeah right

SaorAlba

@CaptHenway said:

Any citations mentioning when and where this was done and for how long? For some reason I am having trouble finding stories posted on the Internet in the 1960's..........

Thanks.

Abraham Lincoln was posting witty sayings on the internets back in the 1860's, so I cannot imagine why you are having a problem with 100 years later.

BLUEJAYWAY

@Higashiyama said:
As others have said, for a while silver coins remained common. My recollection is that they went from being common to scarce quite quickly, e.g., common in early 1967, scarce by early 1968.

I was still pulling silver out of circ. until late 1971. I had a Aunt who was a waitress at a local busy diner. She let me come over twice a week to go through her tip bowl of change.

Overdate

@CaptHenway said:
I seem to remember reading decades ago about either the U.S. Mint or the U.S. Treasury or (more likely) the Federal Reserve Banks running incoming dimes, quarters and halves through special machines to sort out the 90% silver coins before recirculating the clad coins. Does anybody know anything about this? Any citations mentioning when and where this was done and for how long? For some reason I am having trouble finding stories posted on the Internet in the 1960's..........

Thanks.

Here's an indirect reference, from the Congressional Record of October 15, 1969 (page 57 of the PDF):

https://govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-CRECB-1969-pt22/pdf/GPO-CRECB-1969-pt22-4-2.pdf

"With the kind of recirculation going on, where-by the Treasury is picking up silver coins in the way of quarters and dimes still in circulation, and reprocessing them, it can pick up another 3 million ounces."

The discussion was about the metal composition of the proposed Eisenhower dollar.

Overdate

@CaptHenway said:
I seem to remember reading decades ago about either the U.S. Mint or the U.S. Treasury or (more likely) the Federal Reserve Banks running incoming dimes, quarters and halves through special machines to sort out the 90% silver coins before recirculating the clad coins. Does anybody know anything about this? Any citations mentioning when and where this was done and for how long? For some reason I am having trouble finding stories posted on the Internet in the 1960's..........

Thanks.

Here's another reference, from the 1969 Annual Report of the Secretary of the Treasury on the State of the Finances.
**See document page 156 (book page 119) **

"In connection with the Treasury’s program to make silver bullion available for industrial use, the Bureau of the Mint recovered 30.8 million fine ounces of silver from the melting of $38 1/2 million of silver quarters and $4 1/2 million of silver dimes which had been separated from inventories of coins not recirculated by the Federal Reserve System. At the end of fiscal 1968 the Bureau of the Mint had in its inventories circulated coins estimated to contain silver coins equivalent to 114.7 million fine ounces of silver. In addition, the Federal Reserve banks and branches had in their inventories circulated coins estimated to contain silver coins equivalent to 127 million fine ounces of silver. These inventories were the result of a program initiated in fiscal 1968, for recovering the silver from silver coin. This remaining silver will be recovered during fiscal years 1969 and 1970, as the silver coins are separated from the clad coins and are melted."

https://books.googleusercontent.com/books/content?req=AKW5QaeQ32iwdiWHXXo1Hmxmj2UFL_lDXRzc6D-3kbiFEHJdgYyEnTeeU9KGAvUPCO6MMtpLKpYsndkX8uS_YY9nt6izhNj849kdACDG7QHCXkJWAOULdMfjc1taPXbn7L2OErDSiIJpBUuCepxi4XXNptMMT3Pmr3D44glezPjudgZ95zRADbxg3HM1w2WbISQ01BrHTLflUP6xTCJRwoD3Bjappj0PykIkjGLh1r0Yde0SLRGLt_4_8XecbUwSE6oKFET__68NYvKNtFtP6e074B-R68BhzTQVqHKXpe8t81n4aBdGVk4

illini420

A coin story this big must have been written up somewhere in one of the issues of the Numismatist in the mid-1960s... right???

CaptHenway

@Overdate said:

@CaptHenway said:
I seem to remember reading decades ago about either the U.S. Mint or the U.S. Treasury or (more likely) the Federal Reserve Banks running incoming dimes, quarters and halves through special machines to sort out the 90% silver coins before recirculating the clad coins. Does anybody know anything about this? Any citations mentioning when and where this was done and for how long? For some reason I am having trouble finding stories posted on the Internet in the 1960's..........

Thanks.

Here's another reference, from the 1969 Annual Report of the Secretary of the Treasury on the State of the Finances.
**See document page 156 (book page 119) **

"In connection with the Treasury’s program to make silver bullion available for industrial use, the Bureau of the Mint recovered 30.8 million fine ounces of silver from the melting of $38 1/2 million of silver quarters and $4 1/2 million of silver dimes which had been separated from inventories of coins not recirculated by the Federal Reserve System. At the end of fiscal 1968 the Bureau of the Mint had in its inventories circulated coins estimated to contain silver coins equivalent to 114.7 million fine ounces of silver. In addition, the Federal Reserve banks and branches had in their inventories circulated coins estimated to contain silver coins equivalent to 127 million fine ounces of silver. These inventories were the result of a program initiated in fiscal 1968, for recovering the silver from silver coin. This remaining silver will be recovered during fiscal years 1969 and 1970, as the silver coins are separated from the clad coins and are melted."

https://books.googleusercontent.com/books/content?req=AKW5QaeQ32iwdiWHXXo1Hmxmj2UFL_lDXRzc6D-3kbiFEHJdgYyEnTeeU9KGAvUPCO6MMtpLKpYsndkX8uS_YY9nt6izhNj849kdACDG7QHCXkJWAOULdMfjc1taPXbn7L2OErDSiIJpBUuCepxi4XXNptMMT3Pmr3D44glezPjudgZ95zRADbxg3HM1w2WbISQ01BrHTLflUP6xTCJRwoD3Bjappj0PykIkjGLh1r0Yde0SLRGLt_4_8XecbUwSE6oKFET__68NYvKNtFtP6e074B-R68BhzTQVqHKXpe8t81n4aBdGVk4

Excellent. This confirms that they did indeed cull out silver coins from FRB inventories and melt them down for the silver. Unfortunately it does not say HOW they culled them out.

Could have been simply by weight. Didn't they have machinery that checked the weights of precious metal planchets before striking? Should have been simple enough to "reject" clad coins because of their lighter weight.

Thanks!

TD

CaptHenway

@illini420 said:
A coin story this big must have been written up somewhere in one of the issues of the Numismatist in the mid-1960s... right???

Much more likely in Coin World and Numismatic News. Possibly Numismatic Scrapbook.

shorecoll

Just FYI, both Numismatist and Numismatic Scrapbook in the 60's were THICK. Anybody wants to read through a decade of them better have lots of spare time.

Overdate

@CaptHenway

Looks like the program recovered in total about $300 million face value in silver quarters and dimes. From the Fiscal 1970 Annual Report, PDF page 154, report page 130:

“During fiscal 1970 the Bureau of the Mint recovered 50.5 million fine ounces of silver from the melting of $12.6 million of silver quarters and $57.7 million of silver dimes which had been separated from inventories of coins not recirculated by the Federal Reserve System. This program, initiated in fiscal 1968, has provided a total recovery of 212.3 million fine ounces of silver.”

https://fraser.stlouisfed.org/title/annual-report-secretary-treasury-state-finances-194/annual-report-secretary-treasury-state-finances-fiscal-year-ended-june-30-1970-5607

Overdate

@CaptHenway

Here you go . . .

“In June 1967, $1,850,000 was obligated for production units of automatic coin inspection equipment to replace the present manual-visual system of reviewing coins. Because of the speed and accuracy expected of these machines, the cost of reviewing coins should decrease substantially. However, since the delamination inspector had to be converted to separate silver from clad subsidiary coins, the thirteen production units purchased have not been utilized for the purpose intended. They have, however, been invaluable in this coin separation program at both the Mints and Federal Reserve Banks. The other two types of inspection equipment are still getting the bugs out.”

Page 249:

https://books.google.com/books?id=Gw1jwTbLEXUC&pg=PA250&lpg=PA250&dq=federal+reserve+separate+silver+coins+1968&source=bl&ots=ftg_o3Z4AY&sig=ACfU3U0I7QaX4gh5rWONInjarG_XQXfZvA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjN3KqRybTpAhWFqp4KHYI_AcwQ6AEwAHoECAsQAQ#v=onepage&q=federal reserve separate silver coins 1968&f=false

Overdate

@CaptHenway

Also, this . . .

STATUS of AMF INSPECTION EQUIPMENT

Coin separator-delamination inspector. — The American Machine & Foundry Co. has delivered five separator-delamination inspectors. These machines are being used for a purpose not contemplated at the time of the request for reprograming; that is, the separation of silver from clad dimes and quarters in the Treasury Department's program of removing from circulation all such silver coins. Therefore, they are not being used for the purpose intended to yield the savings estimated. Nine additional production units are scheduled for delivery by the end of April at 1-week intervals. They will be used in the silver-clad coin separating task as long as they are needed.

These units as well as the prototype have an attachment in which printed circuit cards can be inserted so that by a change in cards they can be used as either a coin separator or a delamination inspector. When no longer needed for coin separation, they can be switched over to delamination inspection by inserting a different card. Exactly how long this coin separation task will require is very difficult to estimate; however, we have tentatively stated that the bulk of the job should have been completed during fiscal year 1969.

Pages 377-378:

https://books.google.com/books?id=bh4d688BI2sC&pg=PA378&lpg=PA378&dq=%22delamination+inspector%22&source=bl&ots=gOMoXYPzXX&sig=ACfU3U0Y2WEGLronE7lLuKPjlnnuJN7guw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjBmJLqpLXpAhXVrJ4KHUyDB8QQ6AEwAHoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22delamination%20inspector%22&f=false

MsMorrisine

excellent

CaptHenway

Fantastic! Thank you!

idratherbgardening

I have a large collection of Coinage Magazines from that era and there is definitely an article showing the sorting machine they used to automatically pull silver coins out of circulation. I’ll post a pic if I run across it again.

CaptHenway

@idratherbgardening said:
I have a large collection of Coinage Magazines from that era and there is definitely an article showing the sorting machine they used to automatically pull silver coins out of circulation. I’ll post a pic if I run across it again.

Thanks!
TD