When did Key coins become Key coins?

braddick

These days if a coin is scarce or even rare it is known almost instantly. Examples would be the 1972/72. Very few of these are not MintState.
When did some Classic Key coins become so? For example, the 1909-SVDB. About what time frame did collectors realize this was a tough coin? I see many offered in the VG08- XF40 grade, telling me this coin circulated.
When did collectors begin to pull this one out of circulation because word on the street was filtered through to the masses that this coin was scarce?
How about the 1937 3-legged Buffalo? I own one in a PCGS GD06 holder, again telling me this mint error circulated. I also see many offered in the VF range.

How about others? The 1913-S Barber quarter comes to mind. Many of these are offered in the AG03 range. So is the 1885 Liberty nickel.
Were collectors back in those days just not tuned in the what was scarce/rare and what wasn't?

clw54

I think you can tell how early people knew about the scarcity of a particular coin by the price spread between grades. The 1909-S VDB isn't that much more expensive in AU than it is in VG. People must have known about them early. Compare that to a 1916-D Mercury that has huge price differences between grades. Most circulated. The 1914-D cent is another that must have been unknown for years, since most seem to be VG to F.

Fairlaneman

Pat:

I am going to say since the advent of the Major Grading Services some coins have now been put into the Key Coin status. Coming to mind in the series I collect would be the 18S, 18D, 19S, 19D in FB status. Merc's of course. These were hard coins before the services but now with the Very Low populations that have been slabbed the Status has risen.

The 1909S you mentioned is probably still considered a Key Coin because of demand for it but really it is readily available. The same amount of them has been slabbed as the $100 1916P Mercury Dime which is by no means a Key.

Maybe Rarity does not determine whether a coin is a Key. Do you suppose demand is what makes a coin a Key ??

Ken

ARCO

Great question. I love looking back through old redbooks. Seems in absolute terms that many of the hyped "keys" half a century ago were still very expensive in their day. In some cases were proportionally higher than they are now.

The great price appreciation I feel has come from the sleeper dates and Semi-keys, many of which were priced years ago at common date prices or with a slight premium. The burgeoning collector base has driven these dates up in price as many are not available like they were in the 50's or so.

I would imagine that the early coin promotors like B max Mehl and others really promoted the "keys" and they were subsequently collected for the slight premium they fetched, because they were still periodically found in circulation from time to time.

Collectors probably pulled any coin out of circulation that was worth more than face value, at the point that they became worth more than face value. As for the 1909-S VDB, I think it is an expensive coin, but only scarce in a relative sense; scarce compared to the other dates in the series.

As a little experiment watch ebay auctions for one year and see how many F or BTTR 1896-O halves are listed as opposed to the 1909-S VDB. in F or Bttr. When you approach 100 to zero you may stop!!

Conder101

The 09-SVDB started being hoarded about 10 days after it was introduced. It was only produced for eight days and the change eliminating the designers initials was publicized at the time. That is why they are so common in high grade. Some did get out and circulated but even many of those were eventually discovered and hoarded. The early coins mentioned such as the 1885 V nickel basicly went into circulation and stayed there because there were fewer collectors at the time and most of them considered proofs to be "better" so those collectors just bought a proof from the mint and that was it. The collecting of coin by date AND mint didn't become common until the 1920's. Until then most collectors simply collected by date and didn't care what mintmark if any was on the coin.

keithdagen

Claw,

You bring up a good point re: scarcity vs novelty.

The 09-S VDB is a novelty (2x leap from GD price to AU price), there are plenty of examples to go around, and you can find dozens on E-Bay daily. The 13-S quarter is a scarcity (almost 10x leap from GD price to AU price), and they aren't seen that often.

LanLord

Pat, Lange addresses the 09 sVDB in his book (complete guide to Lincoln cents). By the late 20s an unused specimen was going for 45 cents versus 10 cents for those without the VDB. Apparently earlier than that it was known to be of fewer numbers than the 09s without VDB but not with a premium in value. I wonder if the demonination of the coin might be responsible for less attention in the collecting field. If it had been a dime, quarter or half with similarly low mintages, would it have been a hot item right out of the chute?

kranky

It is interesting to read about coins that sneak up on people to become keys in their series. I just read that most of the 3-legged Buffs were released in Montana. I'm thinking... Montana, 1937. They were probably still talking about that "new" design on the quarter. I bet it was a long time before people knew about that one.

dbldie55

Kranky, where did you see that the 3-legged buffs were released in Montana. Since I live here, and have a family history here back to the 1850's I would like to know. It should be pointed out that many of the high grade key Morgans were found here too.

LanLord

dbldie, Lange's book on Buffs covers this topic. Lange has some great books.

kranky

David Lange's The Complete Guide to Buffalo Nickels, 2nd ed.

As quoted by Lange, Aubrey Bebee (a now-deceased longtime dealer) wrote that he believed Montana was the main "stomping grounds" of the 3-legged Buffalos. While traveling the West he stopped in Bozeman in 1939 where someone from there told him about the existence of the 3-legged nickel. He went to the bank and got 4 $50 bags of nickels and found 30 3-leggers. In Great Falls he didn't find as many but the ones he did find were Uncs.

pmh1nic

The grading service may have played another role (minor role?) in helping to create a key date coin by determining (at least by their standards) what is a "collectible" coin. They reduce the number of "collectible" coins by body bagging the ones that they consider to have been harshly cleaned, ATed, whizzed or for some other reason they don't consider a worthy candidate for encapsulation.

jom

Classic "key coins" were created when the mintage was published. 16-D Dime, 16-P Quarter, 09-S VDB etc etc.

After the advent of the grading services "key coins" have been added because of grade rarity like some FB dimes etc.

You'll also notice there is a difference in how most "classic key dates" are priced as opposed to "grade rarities". Classics tend to go up linearly in price versus grade whereas the "grade rarities" (by definition) go up exponentially in price versus grade.

jom

braddick

I understand that most 1955/55 cents are located in AU or better with very few in circulated grades. Same with the 1950-D Jefferson. In fact, finding one in FN12 is tougher than MS65!
So, I'd assume after WWII Collectors began to collect in earnest and were more aware what was collectible and what wasn't.
Possibly the beginning of publishing the Red Book (1946 with the 1947 issue) helped.

It would have been fun though to live back when spending a PROOF Trade dollar wasn't a big deal or that "CC" Morgan or 5$ gold coin was common place.
I also see so many 1793 Chain Cents in PO01 to GD04 to know that hardly anyone cared back then even though this was a one year design type!

steventheyn

Another interesting story is the 1931-S Lincoln Cent. When this came out everyone knew this was a rare coin. So everyone started to hoard it. That why it's only $100 in unc. while the 1914-D Lincoln Cents mintage was larger than that of the 31-S nobody knew it was rare and that's why it's thousands of $'s in unc.

keets

steven----the same thing goes for a 38-D walker. it was hoarded and has a healthy pop in MS and not a very steep price when you consider the low mintage.

al h.

steventheyn

keets- don't forget about the 1950-D nickel. Those have been traded in rolls sinse day one.

cladking

The rarest coins have been the coins that have been overlooked rather than the coins
with low mintages for many years now. This is because since about the 1890's the mint-
ages have always been substantially higher than the base number of people who collect
the coins. When demand goes up due to increasing numbers of collectors then prices in-
crease in inverse proportion to the number extant. Until 1964 the number surviving was
typically determined mostly by mintage. There were notable exceptions like the 09-S vdb
which was heavily saved or the 14-D which was relatively ignored. Some issues were al-
most universally saved like the 31-S cent or the 50-D nickel. Since 1964 most coins exist
in inverse relation to their mintage since many save only the lower mintages.

The 37-D was released in various places. Montana was apparently one of the largest releases.
A friend's father who grew up in Indianapolis says that in grade school he and his classmates
would have contests to see who could find the largest number of three legged buffs. He didn't
remember how many it took to win but he said he had more than two and lost. Unfortunately
he didn't save any.

supercoin

Cool thread! I'll add mine for Ikes... the keys were originally thought to be the "low-mintage" coins (73-S proof and 73-P/D mint set coins).

But with the passage of time, it turns out that 1 to 2 million Ikes are enough to go around and mintage-rarity has been a non-event (with the exception of some well-known varieties).

In fact it has turned out to be almost exactly the opposite -- some of the lowly common dates have turned out to be the most difficult to find in high grade, and are now the key dates that command the largest premiums now (i.e. a dirt-common 1972-P is very scarce and expensive in MS66).

Professional grading has had a lot to do with that. I think some collectors were catching on before then, but it wasn't until pop reports that you could see that it wasn't just you having trouble finding a nice 1972-P.

shylock

The 1909-S Indian Head is another that was stashed away at the time of issue due to its last year status and a new general awareness of numismatics & low mintages. It soon was overshadowed by the new Lincoln design and was forgotten about for decades before re-emerging, value wise, towards the later half of the century.

The 1877 IH wasn't saved at all at the time of issue. Its rarity wasn't recognized until the 1890s by which time very few circulated examples could be found. It's the one year in which the actual IH mintage figures provided by the mint, low as they were, are questioned, and there's speculation that some were melted or never released. Bowers writes about a correspondent of the New York Sun's article in 1915 of 4 different "census tests" he did in which he calculated the % of 1877s found in large samples of cents from his bank. In 1881 he found 6 in 1250 cents (.0048%), in 1883 he found 11 in 2950 cents (.0037%), and in 1896 found 24 in 10100 cents (.0023%).The final census in 1897 recorded 35 in 28450 cents (.0012%). In 17 years it reached the vanishing point.

jom

<< <i>Professional grading has had a lot to do with that. I think some collectors were catching on before then, but it wasn't until pop reports that you could see that it wasn't just you having trouble finding a nice 1972-P. >>



I'm not sure that is quite true. I wasn't really reading Pop reports in the early 90s when I tried to put a gem set of raw Ikes together. After you've gone thru crappy deal inventory for a year trying to find a nice 71P, 72P, 76P (1) and a nice 71-S silver it really is no surprise to see the Pop report tells you the same thing.

jom