The Casino Cashout Mystery

    At the nearby casino here in Des Plaines, Il. dozens of times I've become aware their cashout terminals dispensing old nickels, particularly 1940-41 and have no idea why?  I have a very small coin collection and maybe why I notice them but hard to believe no one else would.  After so many decades and there they are, still out in circulation.  

     It just makes me wonder if this also happens at the LV casinos?  Is not only there.  Last summer getting change at the grocery store I noticed I was given a 1936 quarter, still hae it.  Back in 1991 while visiting a friend/casino employee in Reno,  told me now and then the $1 token slots would sometimes, rarely, dispense an actual silver dollar.  But those days, I know are long over.  Someone out there must be aware of this.  I can't be the only one.

                Tim

Actually, any old coins could theoretically stay in circulation for quite some time, but any older/valuable larger-denomination coins will be removed by numismatists. Stuff like nickels and pennies isn't worth bothering to shift through.

Coins do wear out, so the way a coin achieves "longevity" is to sit in a vault for a long time. Banks and casinos store large amounts of coin.

One of the only things fun about actual coins in machines was that years ago, you'd once in a while get a silver quarter.   You didn't even have to look, as you could hear a different sound when it hit the payout tray.

Dealers (and players) used to watch for older quarters (or were they half dollars?) showing up in the coin trays.  Never came across any in recent times.

It was both; you just needed to observe the edges of the coins. All the Franklin halves, the first year of the Kennedy halves, and all quarters before 1964 were silver "clad"--that changed to copper, with the difference clearly visible.

I remember back then, the silver clad coins were worth five times their face value (when I was dealing--mid 80s). If we kept our own tokes, and someone toked us a dollar, we'd switch it out for any silver coins in the tray and drop those in the toke box 

Yeah, the 'copper' shade of those coins' edges.  Thanks, Kevin.