Is it just me, or is there an enormous number of 1964 5-cent pieces still in circulation? I noticed this a few years back, and once raided the change jar for an informal study. Out of 20 nickles, 8 were of the year 1964, and this was in the year 1997. Was there a large shipment found in a warehouse or something?
Take a look at this link. It shows how many nickels are printed in each year. It clearly shows that 1964 was some sort of “Let’s Make a Boatload of Nickels” year: more nickels were produced that year than any other. Maybe they were running out? Because they didn’t have to make anywhere near as much again until 1999… Anyone got the skinny on why so many in 1964?
Makes sense, yabob, but why the heck did they strike coins in 65 with the 64 date? Why not just make a big old pile of 1965?
Two reasons. They had just closed the Denver Mint. So they really,really needed to keep making small change as fast as possible. And it would have taken time to make those new 1965 dies. So, while gearing up for the 1965 coins, they truly had to keep on striking coins night and day.
Nobody ever closed the Denver Mint; it’s still running today. In fact, turn those 1964 nickels over, and chances are some of them will have a little D off to the right of Monticello. What they did in 1965 was to remove the “D” mint mark from coins struck in Denver, because someone convinced Congress that the coin shortage was being caused by coin collectors. It wasn’t; it was really caused by silver speculators. D and S mint marks were re-introduced in 1968 (and moved them to the obverse); some time in the '70s they started adding P mint marks to the Philadelphia mint coins, except the cent. yabob has the correct answer.