General question on Bank Rolled Silver Quarters (and other coins for that matter)

thekramers5

I was talking to a friend of mine about going through my dad's coins and getting some graded. He was fascinated and mentioned that he has a couple rolls of silver quarters he inherited from his grandparents that are straight from the bank - I'm unsure of the date, but he said thinks they are 50s & 60s, but "definitely silver". He said his brother has some other rolls from the same time period, but isn't sure if they are even quarters.

My question to the board is ... do original bank rolls like this often have solid, gradeable coins? I've always been amazed about how nice SOME of my dad's B.U./Gem coins have been, because it doesn't look like they were ever in contact with another coin.

Anyway, he's wondering if they are more valuable opened and cherry-picked for grading (since I now have a membership), or better off left original in the roll?

Thanks!

jmski52

Original rolls that have never been opened carry a premium most of the time because of the "possibilities". In the case of 1960's silver, there may or may not be some coins in the roll that make a nicer grade or a nicer specimen, but you never know until you search the roll.

I've accumulated a bunch of these rolls. I opened some rolls for the end of roll toners, and I did take a cursory look at some of the coins in-between. In doing so, it brought back memories of searching rolls when I was a kid. Most of the coins I looked at were mushy strikes and/or bag-marked, so I lost interest and simply stuck them away.

However, there is always the possibility that if I had continued looking I might have come up with some nice specimens. In other words, these rolls are simply a window into the past and the window reveals that most of these coins were struck for circulation and were not specially-handled or struck from polished or specially-prepared dies. The ones I looked at had die polishing on many of them, which tells me that they were not early strikes, and also explains the mushi-ness of some of the strikes.

Like I said, if I had kept looking, I might have found something else. I assume that your rolls would be similarly unpredictable.

thekramers5

Thanks for the info and insight!

Tim

ProofArtworkonCircs

If these quarters came from the Eastern half of the country, you might find a few type B's in them.
I have no idea what the Western experience would be.