Family empties grandad's coin jar after 70 years — spent a whole week counting an unexpected fortune

People don't usually hit a jackpot while emptying coin jars and piggy banks but the practice of counting loose change after all that time consistently retains its charm. However, sometimes it proves to be a cumbersome task especially when the change has been collected for more than 70 years. This is something a Redditor had to do after coming across their grandad's coin jar. Although it took quite a while for the family to sort and count the coins, they did end up with a hefty payout.

A Coin Collection Seven Decades in the Making

On the popular forum called r/Pics, the Redditor shared a picture of the massive jar full of coins. In the replies, they mentioned that the jar contained several denominations and some rare coins as well.

In the replies to the post, the Redditor shared that his grandpa was 91 years old and he asked them to count the total money in the coin jar as he wanted to know how much he had collected over his lifetime. Hence the children and grandchildren of the elderly man all came together and pulled off the mammoth task. The Redditor shared that they planned to use a free coin-counting machine that was available nearby. However, sorting through the collection and picking out the rare ones was the bigger challenge. 

Since the jar was made of glass, they had a tough time making sure that it didn't break while being transported. Emptying it wasn't easy either as they had to do everything with carefully planned steps.

Finally, after a week's hard work, the coins from the jar were all collected, sorted, and counted. The Redditor shared that it contained coins that were more than 100 years old and the collection looked mighty impressive when laid out in front of them. They shared that the oldest coin of the pile was a 1928 wheat penny, and the newest coin was a 2023 dime. There were also some silver quarters, mercury dimes, a silver dollar. and 33 Sacagawea golden dollar coins.

They finally took everything to the counting machine where another challenge awaited them. They had to shovel the coins which weighed more than 164 pounds (with the jar), into the machine. After putting in some elbow grease, the family was finally able to count all the coins, and the total was a whopping $2052.76, which is impressive for a casual coin jar collection. 

The final task was to deposit the coins in the bank and the Redditor shared that they made a direct deposit which took about an hour. "One teller was cheering us on, and a few people in line with their own coin bags took a look at our duffle bags and left!" the user wrote in the replies.

Fellow Redditors had been keenly following the post for the family to share more updates and one of them, u/ontour4eternity wrote, "Thank you for the update- this jar of coins has kept me up at night! I'm glad you went trough and pulled out any old and valuable ones," 

Several others congratulated the Redditor on the feat and lauded the grandad as well. Many argued that the jar had coins that were worth a lot more than their face value. "Holy cow! And that's just face value coins!! Well done and I really hope you spend some time researching old coins. Some of those probably worth a fat stack on their own!" suggested u/Dropthetenors. 

For more updates follow u/Crimsonkitsune333 on Reddit.