The E-Sylum:  Volume 10, Number 45, November 4, 2007, Article 20

JACKSON METALS OF OHIO WANTS TO RESUME MELTING PRE-1982 CENTS

Dick Johnson writes: "Jackson Metals of Jackson, Ohio,
had been melting cents, as least the pre-1982 high content
copper coins, until the U.S. Treasury issued a ban on their
destruction in December last year. The ban became effective
in April 2007.

"Company owner, Walter Luhrman, contacted his U.S. Congressman,
Rep Zack Space, who amended a coin-composition bill to allow
his constituant's firm to return to melting the pre-1982 cents.
But Illinois Representative Jerry Costello raised concerns
about how changing composition legislation would affect a
company in his state that supplies the U.S. Mint with coinage
strips or blanks.

"According to the article Mr. Luhrman argues 'he culls out
pre-1982 pennies, which used more copper than the current
copper-plated zinc ones, and sells some to collectors. He
then redistributes the three-quarters of the pennies left
over to areas of the country where there are shortages. He
maintains that, as a result, the Mint could produce fewer
cents each year. That would be no small item  when you consider
that 6.58 billion cents were produced this year at a cost
ranging from 1.4 cents to 1.6 cents, according to the Mint.'

"Coin World editor Beth Deisher is quoted as disagreeing
with his argument. She knows of no such areas with a shortage
of cents. 'If there are shortages,' she stated 'he (Jackson
Metals) is creating them."

"I wonder where Luhrman is getting his stock of cents where
one-quarter are pre-1982 cents.

"The story was published in the Columbus Dispatch, written
by Jonathan Riskind, with contribution of numismatist
Gerald Tebben."

To read the complete article, see:
Full Story
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  Wayne Homren, Editor

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