I found the love of collecting old poured silver ingots about 5 years ago. Collecting vintage bullion just comes down to what you love, what catches your eye. It becomes an obsession from there.
Many of the bars I collect, were poured in the late 60’s and 70’s, through mid 80’s. There was an abundance of companies pouring silver at this time, however it came to a roaring halt on Silver Thursday, which was an event that occurred in the United States on March 27, 1980 following the attempt by brothers Nelson Bunker Hunt, William Herbert Hunt and Lamar Hunt to corner the silver market. Silver had reached a high of $50/oz at that time. What happened to all those beautiful old poured bars you might ask? Most of the melting took place in 1979 and 1980, when silver bullion soared to an all-time high of $50 an ounce. At that point, the silver bars were worth far more as metal than as money or collectibles. Hence the Great Melt occurred and created a whole new market for collecting.
Vintage can mean different things to different people, but to me, it’s any bar produced from mid 1980s and earlier. Again, there is no hard or fast rule here, just a guideline on what’s considered vintage.
Collecting can encompass everything from 1 oz to 100 gram pieces, which I refer to as “silver smalls” to 5, 10, 20+, 50+ and 100+ oz pieces.
With this blog site, my goal is to showcase and chronicle my collection alphabetically, putting pieces in “alphabetized boxes.”
Hope you enjoy the journey as much as I do.
Vintage Silver Bars 
Excellent blog. I am totally new to collecting silver smalls. I have a beautifully toned 10 ouncer, poured by the company N.R.C. Not sure what the initials stand for. No serial number–could that mean it is older than the 60’s?
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Sorry for the delay. I have seen a few of these. I believe 70s era. Not sure on the make. There were a lot of industrial pours back then with many varieties of 3 letter refiners. 100s like this. That was the golden age of silver.
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