Coin Price Guide

Value of Wheat Pennies

The wheat penny values in this price guide are the actual prices coin dealers will pay you for your wheat pennies. These are not the retail coin price guide found in nearly the other coin price guide, which, if relied upon to appraise your wheat cents, will result in great disappointment when you go to sell them. If you use a wholesale coin value guide like this one, you will get an honest appraisal of what your wheat pennies are worth if you had to sell them today. While past price appreciation never guarantees future growth, these silver dollar values have consistently trended upward over time.

All wheat pennies are worth at least triple their face value unless they are badly damaged or almost totally worn out. Some wheat back cents, though, called key dates, are worth hundreds, even thousands of times their face value! Find out how much your wheat pennies are worth in this coin values table below. Keep in mind that these are guidelines. To get today's current market prices, you should contact a coin dealer.

Individuals or small groups of students need to gather samples of 100 pennies that are presently in circulation around the United States. Samples should come from coins that are actually in circulation. Do not use coins that have been in long-term storage. Parents and relatives are a good source for samples, piggy banks are not.

Coin Price Guide

Special Note: The price of copper has risen to the point where copper U.S. pennies are worth 3 or more cents each just in copper bullion value. A coin dealer is still unlikely to give you more than what is listed in the table, though, because he has to make a profit, although some dealers are paying 3 and half cents ($0.035) now for common wheats.

Coin Price Guide

Pre-1982 pennies contain a much greater percentage of copper. Post-1982 pennies are mostly zinc. Show the broken penny, which is mostly zinc inside. Show them a copper, "silver" and "gold" penny. Talk about how the zinc atoms on top of the copper atoms make the pennies look silver. The zinc atoms move in between the copper atoms. Help students visualize this be putting one of your hands on top of your other hand the show that if heat makes your fingers move it allows fingers from one hand to move in between the fingers of your other hand. Copper and zinc atoms make brass and looks like gold. Ask if anyone plays a saxophone or a trumpet? These are made of brass.

The weight of 160 pennies - also known as a one-cent coin - comes to a pound, worth a face value of $1.60. But - with each penny made of 97.5 per cent zinc and 2.5 per cent copper - based on current prices, the metal value is worth about $1.36.

The first Lincoln Wheat Pennies were issued in 1909, the 100th anniversary of Lincoln's birth. In 1943, the Lincoln penny was made of steel (with a zinc coating) because copper was needed for military use in World War II.

In the five o'clock shadow of the rupee's close shave, Washington is considering ways to reduce the cost of making pennies and nickels. Among them, giving the mint authority to use cheaper metals, like steel. And though efforts in Congress to retire the penny altogether have failed in past years, its detractors say the time has come.

"Inflation has rendered the penny nearly valueless, right? If you can't buy anything with a penny, if it takes at least a nickel or a dime to buy anything, then that individual unit just doesn't serve much good," argues Stephen Dubner, the co-author of the bestseller "Freakonomics," a zany look at money and American culture. He puts the penny in the same category as your pesky appendix and other useless relics.

Heat zinc plated copper pennies in the flame of a Bunsen burner. Turn the penny in the flame as it heats. The zinc and copper atoms form brass. The copper and zinc atoms merged to produce "gold" pennies.

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