US Silver Half Dollars| Valuable Links To Our Past Heritage

by Andrew Spaeth on Wednesday, February 24th, 2010 | No Comments

Collecting US silver half dollars is a great way to link to our nation's past heritage.

It can also be a valuable hobby because even the ugliest most worn silver half dollars are worth the weight of the silver in them.

The US Mint minted silver half dollars from 1794 up till 1970. The silver half dollars minted from 1794 till 1836 were just over 89% silver. From the introduction of the bust silver half dollars in 1836 and up until 1964, these coins were 90% silver. Silver half dollars minted from 1965-1970 were 40% silver.

The first silver half dollars to be minted were the Flowing Hair variety. The mint struck 23,464 of these coins in 1794 and 299,680 in 1796. These half dollar coins are very rare and expensive and are not often seen by average collectors.

From 1796 to 1807 the Mint produced Draped bust silver half dollars, with none being struck in the years 1798-1800. These are also fairly uncommon coins with a number of unique die varieties. This is another type of half dollar coin that average coin hobbyists will not likely deal with.

From 1807 to 1839 the mint struck various of Capped Bust and Bust silver half dollars. These coins are more widely available but with average circulated coins selling for an average of $50 to well over $100 these are not coins that average collectors seek out.

From 1839 to 1891 the US mint produced several varieties of Seated Liberty silver half dollars. Average circulated coins of these varieties are more affordable in the $28 to $50 range but some of the dates, especially the later dates, are quite rare, so putting together a complete set may be difficult for the average collector.

From 1892 to to 1970 the US Mint produced the 4 types of silver half dollars that are the most popular & most collected.

These are the Barber Half Dollar, The Walking Liberty Half Dollar, The Franklin Half Dollar, And the Kennedy Half Dollar. These are the coins most average collectors are interested in and these are the ones this site will focus on.

All of these type silver half dollars from 1892 up to 1964 contain 90% silver, with each coin containing .3617 ounces of pure silver. The Barber and Walking Liberty coins are all worth more than their silver value, and care should be taken not to sell these as scrap bullion for this reason. Heavily circulated Franklin and 1964 Kennedy Halves will sell for their bullion value and do not carry much of a premium beyond that. When completing an entire collection of these coins, do so with the best grade coins you can find.

From 1965-1970 The Kennedy silver half dollars contained 40% silver.

These coins contained .1749 ounces of silver each and are not worth much more than their silver content. You can often find these silver half dollars along with the 1964 90% silver half dollars by going to local banks and buying up the rolled halves that they have. Many people do not realize that they were silver in these years. Often you can purchase them right out of the tellers till. The 1970 half dollar was not minted for circulation and was released only in US mint sets. If you find one in circulation it was likely broken out of a stolen Mint Set and spent.

Welcome to the world of collecting US silver half dollars! More posts coming soon...