I began collecting in 1963. I never saw any Barber coins or Indian head pennies. Buffalo nickels, dateless SLQs, and Mercury dimes were pretty common back then.
If I recall, the New York Subway Hoard—collected by public transit employees in NY over a period spanning the mid 1940s through the first years of the 1950s—contained two complete sets of Barber dimes.
Old silver circulated until they stopped making new silver coins. In 1980, when I unloaded my common silver coins for ridiculous money, I had some Barber coinage included in this sale. The metallic value of silver exceeded the numismatic value of the Barber coins. Weird.
"Vou invadir o Nordeste, "Seu cabra da peste, "Sou Mangueira......."
A clue can be found based on what kids (me) collected in the early-mid 1950's. Lincolns, Buffs, Mercs, SLQ's, and Walkers. Barbers, IHC's and V nickels would pop up occasionally in change, but it was unusual enough that we didn't collect them. So, I would guess that Barbers "effectively" stopped appearing in the mid-tp-late 40's.
In the depression most barber coinage that had been previously saved reenterred circulation. There wasn't a great deal of it that had been saved but better dates and higher grades and a lot of this was held by those who couldn't afford to keep it. Then by 1942 most people were employed and had more money and more ability to hold onto it. By the end of WW II nicer specimens and better dates were simply gone. The economy boomed the next ten years (after a slow start) and almost anything that was in F or better was gone. By the late-'50's there was little left but culls and very low grades of common dates.
Baby boomers scoured circulation for anything "unusual" starting in the early '50's. Coins like '09-S VDB cents were more than 99% gone from circulation by the start of the war. Coin collectors cause selective attrition by removing whatever is popular. Where cents may have had a two or three percent annual attrition the '09-S cents had had more like a 10% attrition since the onset of the depression in 1929. Many of the VDB's were saved out initially so a 10% attrition decimated circulating versions in short order.
Comments
They still must be in circulation today - people are finding them in cent rolls on eBay all of the time!
"When they can't find anything wrong with you, they create it!"
I started collecting in February 1961. I never found any Barber coins.
I began collecting in 1963. I never saw any Barber coins or Indian head pennies. Buffalo nickels, dateless SLQs, and Mercury dimes were pretty common back then.
If I recall, the New York Subway Hoard—collected by public transit employees in NY over a period spanning the mid 1940s through the first years of the 1950s—contained two complete sets of Barber dimes.
Old silver circulated until they stopped making new silver coins. In 1980, when I unloaded my common silver coins for ridiculous money, I had some Barber coinage included in this sale. The metallic value of silver exceeded the numismatic value of the Barber coins. Weird.
"Seu cabra da peste,
"Sou Mangueira......."
A clue can be found based on what kids (me) collected in the early-mid 1950's. Lincolns, Buffs, Mercs, SLQ's, and Walkers. Barbers, IHC's and V nickels would pop up occasionally in change, but it was unusual enough that we didn't collect them. So, I would guess that Barbers "effectively" stopped appearing in the mid-tp-late 40's.
In the depression most barber coinage that had been previously saved reenterred circulation. There wasn't a great deal of it that had been saved but better dates and higher grades and a lot of this was held by those who couldn't afford to keep it. Then by 1942 most people were employed and had more money and more ability to hold onto it. By the end of WW II nicer specimens and better dates were simply gone. The economy boomed the next ten years (after a slow start) and almost anything that was in F or better was gone. By the late-'50's there was little left but culls and very low grades of common dates.
Baby boomers scoured circulation for anything "unusual" starting in the early '50's. Coins like '09-S VDB cents were more than 99% gone from circulation by the start of the war. Coin collectors cause selective attrition by removing whatever is popular. Where cents may have had a two or three percent annual attrition the '09-S cents had had more like a 10% attrition since the onset of the depression in 1929. Many of the VDB's were saved out initially so a 10% attrition decimated circulating versions in short order.
As always, great information!