I have a modest collection of coins and bills. I’ve never been into collecting super high grade coins, just ones I find attractive. I really like the look of a well worn coin or one with nice toning. In fact, some of my favourites were pretty cheap and are not very good grade. I’m into discontinued designs over current styles, silver over clad. I love errors of all kinds.
I also have some proofs and a handful of mint sets as well as various silver “rounds”.
Not long ago I started collecting star notes (reprinted notes with a star in the serial number). Today I realized I had over $60 in star notes -mostly ones in very good shape.
Today, I just bought my favourite coin I own. A 1918s US Mercury dime. It is in fair shape but it was the lovely deep bulls eye toning that caused me to buy it. It is quite the handsome piece.
So, anyone elese here have the same bug? Got a favourite?
I did when I was a little kid. Not old coins, or anything; I’d just get coins from as many countries as I could.
I have a 1912 UK penny lying around somewhere, but then most people who’ve lived in Britain have one; they’re a dime a dozen. (sorry, sorry)
I also have a 1942 German 10 pfennig coin which I found buried on a beach.
Then there are probably another 300-odd random foreign coins buried in the bag. I don’t know if they’re worth anything; I found the collection again a few months ago, after it had been buried for nine years in one of the shipping containers that our stuff came along in when we moved to the US.
My kids love that kind of stuff **Dim One{/b] They have a jar with coins from most of the places I have been and the family tries to get them coins and smaller bills when they go abroad. My son in particular spends hours playing with them, he definitely has the collector bug he got from his dad!
I have a pretty eclectic collection from all over the world. Although I prefer the large silver coins, I have a lot of coins that just caught my interest.
As favorites go, it’s not so much the coin as it is the circumstance of finding them. For instance, I was in a flea market in Mali (coins are scarce in Mali), asking vendors if they had coins. One guy starts rummaging around under a wooden bench and comes up with a clay cup FULL of bronze coins covered with about an inch of red dust.
Upon examination, I find that he has about 30 5-Franc coins, all dated 1938, 1939 and 1940, and they are in absolutely near-mint condition. On a whim, I bought them for the exorbitant price of about $15. When I got back to my coin book, I found that the 1938 coins were worth about $70 apiece. Turns out these were coins minted solely for the Algerian colony just before WWII.
My retired neighbor told me one day that she “had some coins” she would like me to try to sell for her. I went over to her place and she hands me three bank bags. I managed to get them back to the house and when I dumped them out, one bag was full of silver Kennedies, one was full of silver Franklins and the third was full of silver Walkers! The Kennedies were mint, the Franklins were all at least VF to MS-60, with the Walkers being the poorer condition. I culled out the best for my own collection and sold the rest. A great find!
I’m not trained at it, but I’m pretty good at getting the grades right.
It does depend on the coin. If it’s an older coin (pre-1900) I’m not always sure what I’m looking for. But most US coins after 1900 I can get a pretty close grade.
Around 1990 I used to work at a check cashing place in San Diego, and I’d find some weird stuff in the bundles that came from the bank. Lots of $1 and $5 silver certificates, but my biggest find was a $100 gold certificate. I also remember seeing a $20 bill with a different picture of the White House on back (I don’t mean the one that was phased out a few years ago, but the one before that). Unfortunatly, I couldn’t afford to keep that kind of money as souveniers.
I remember when I was about 7 or 8 I had some two dollar bills with the series year sometime in the early sixties. They had red tresury seals and serial numbers, and a very nice picture of Monticello on the back. I probably spent them on baseball cards or something.
And of course I’m on the State Quarter Bandwagon. I have a book with space for one example from each mint, even though you can’t see the mint mark when they’re in the book. I’m surprised how abundant the Philadelphia quarters are out here in California, now that I’m actually checking.
When I was a kid, somebody in my family, my grandmother or an aunt, I can’t remember which, gave me a bag which supposedly contained foreign coins. I got a little suspicious when everything seemed to be in Pesos, for example, there was a Japanese Peso :dubious:
So one time in school when showing them in a class I was taking, the teacher pointed out that they weren’t real. Feeling embarrassed, I made up some sort of lie about how I had real coins and fake ones, and how I must have mixed them up…
I was on Littleton’s “approval” service when I was in high school back in the '70s. They’d send some selection, based on what you requested. Then, you’d send them a check (well, in my case, a money order, since I didn’t have a checking account) for the ones you wanted, and send back the ones you didn’t. I selected foreign coins as what I wanted. As the result, I have hundreds of foreign coins from all over the world.
Now, they’re just junk coins. Real, but with no collector value. However, for a kid growing up in Assboink, SC, in that era, it seemed really cool to get all these coins from places I had only read about.
However, I do remember the first two foreign coins I ever, ever got–years before Littleton. When I was in Second Grade, one of my classmates game me this really strange coin. I have no idea why he gave it to me, but I kept it. It was one-lira coin from Vatican City. (Not that there’s anything particularly strange about it, but to a second-grader at that locale and time-cale, it was different.)
Then, sometime between Second and Fourth Grade, my aunt gave me a coin from Taiwan. She was living with her son, who was stationed in Taiwan at the time. I don’t remember exactly what that coin was (and since it’s boxed up now, I can’t just go look at it), but it was an aluminum chiao (maybe 2 chiao) coin. Sun Yat-Sen’s face on the front, and, I believe, a map of Taiwan on the back.
If you send a list and approximate condition, I may be able to help you. Otherwise, buy yourself a copy of the Krause Standard Catalog of World Coins (or U.S coins, if that’s all you have) and you should be able to figure it out for yourself. Coin grading is a bit subjective for the amateur (and for some ‘experts’), but you can get it in the ballpark with a little practice. The Krause books have a grading guide.
I have an eccletic collection of both American and many foreign coins. I would have to say that my favorite though are my indian head pennies. I have about thirty or so and just really like them for some odd reason. Best way to grade is to buy a coin collecting magazine (there are many good ones) and locate the nearest dealer. Quite often they can grade them and appraise or can send you to someone who can. Happy hunting for some good finds.
I’ve got a small collection. Most of it is foreign.
My aunt was a serious collecter and she gave me an uncirculated Canadian Centennial set in a plastic case. It only goes up to the fifty cent piece, but she also gave me a paper dollar. It’s got “1867-1967” in place of the serail number. I’ve got a full 1968 set too. I’ve also got a “shinplaster”, a 25 cent bill. It’s dated 1900.
The first coin I got (well, my parents got for me!) was a 1960 silver dollar. Heavy sucker! The man they bought my crib from gave it to them as a good luck piece. I’ve also got a 1959 penny that the neighbour, Mrs Smith, brought over and gave to my mom. It was put in my baby book with the idea that I’d put it in my shoe at my wedding.
The oldest coin I have is an 1865 English penny. I guess it’s the oldest thing I own, although I also have a ha’pence that has the same face of Queen Victoria, but the date is gone. The penny is in pretty rough shape, but I love it. I can just imagine a little girl in crinolines walking to the shop with her nanny and buying toffee. Can you picture it? Heck, the thing’s older than Canada!
Yes and no. The “Province of Canada” issued it’s own coins starting in 1858. If, by Canada, you mean the confederation of the provinces with Nova Scotia and New Brunswick in 1867, then you’re corrrect.
I have a collection of state quarters, foreign coins, and US coins older than I am. My oldest coin is a 1907 nickel I got in my 7-11 change, the oldest foreign coin a 1956 shilling I found in the parking lot behind my apartment house.
I do some collecting, though right now they are all in a couple of bags. I don’t go for the US coins, except to try and fill up those coin books. I have I would say 80-90% of the newer ones filled, but I kind of stopped after it became to hard to remember what I needed.
I also have a ton of foreign coins as well, most of them I have collected on my travels. I have coins from Ireland, England, Germany, France, Holland, Russia, and Poland. I also have bills from a lot of these countries as well, if the denomination was small enough. This year when I goto Europe I plan on getting coins/bills from all the eastern Europe countries that I visit before they switch to the Euro.
I don’t have too many old coins, except my father gave me his collection on pennies from when he was a kid. I do have one or two Roman coins though, I think I have two, I just don’t know where the second one is.
I also have a few US bills, many from my Grandmother who gave them to me when I was a kid. I have some really nice $2 bills that have stamps on them, though don’t know why. I also used to get some strange bills when I worked McDs, I got 3-4 silver dollars bills that I kept.
I have a buttload of silver quarters and wheat pennies (I now HATE wheat pennies), a bunch of bicentennial quarters, mercury dimes, buffalo nickles, silver dimes, and old Canadian coins.
I collected coins when I was around 13, so I’ve forgotten most of what I knew.
But my favs are the ancient coins (roman-era, never been appraised).
The come the
1943 half dollar
1863 o penny
1922 dollar
1898 dime
1904 nickle
1897 o dollar
buffalo nickles
1905 quarter
1906 half dollar
And this NEAT 1954 penny that’s blood red and black. Grooooovy. Only wheat penny I don’t hate.
