# The New Golden Dollar- Anyone Use One? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [May 5, 2000, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669 "2000-05-05T15:45:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Fanny\_May](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3be4f8/32.png) [@Fanny\_May](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fanny_May)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/41 "2000-05-09T16:45:49Z")
Don’t hoard them. When they changed the size of the $1 bill in the Depression, everyone said the old money would someday be collectable. It is, but always worth a lot less than if you’d converted the old ones into the lowest-paying savings bonds. (aside)You know how personal checks are the same size as $1 bills, well the larger company checks were the same size as the old bills. Not a coincidence, as the banks issued the checks and wanted everything to fit in the same tills and other equipment. Companies kept the old size however, since they lots of pre-printed checks and more clout to resist change. ---
**Author:** ![mrblue92](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@mrblue92](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrblue92)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/42 "2000-05-09T17:02:50Z")
> [@](#): > > If they were easier to get, I’d spend sackies all the time! That cracked me up… If they were easier to get, I’d spend $100 bills all the time! > [@](#): > > They cost me $1.65, but that’s fair. Everyone has their idea of fair prices, but a 65% markup is _huge_ for a new coin. Unless the coin is a proof (S) or uncirculated (P,D) straight from the mint, sackies are only really worth face value to collectors–there are likely millions in circulation already. ---
**Author:** ![mrblue92](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@mrblue92](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mrblue92)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/43 "2000-05-09T17:06:55Z")
> [@](#): > > I believe that Suzies were first minted in 1979, the 10th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing, so this makes sense. IIRC, the reverse of the Suzies was very similar to the Eisenhower dollars, which were first minted in 1970, the year after… ---
**Author:** ![Suo\_Na](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/898d66/32.png) [@Suo\_Na](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suo_Na)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2000, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/44 "2000-05-09T23:11:58Z")
This is interesting. I was just about to post how I got 17 of the darn things yesterday from a stamp machine, and how none of them are gold, when I checked them and realised that all 17 are Susan B’s (thanks to whoever mentioned the eagle landing on the moon.) Bear in mind that I’ve never seen one before; I’m Canadian. However, I don’t know whether to be pleased or not. Now I have 17 Suzies but I’ve still never seen a Sackie. ---
**Author:** ![Beakeroni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@Beakeroni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beakeroni)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2000, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/45 "2000-05-15T08:00:15Z")
I got ten Sackies from my credit union (that’s all they would give me at one time). I put them in my golf bag for those days when I make small bets on the golf course and I wind up paying out more money than I have in my jeans (really embarrassing btw). They’re all gone. Came in handy though. I have got to get some more. Dollar bills socked away in Golf bags don’t stay very nice if it should happen to rain. I noticed that all of my Sackies were stained. I presume that they were fairly fresh from the mint…so what’s up with that? Anybody else get discolored coins? ---
**Author:** ![Initial\_Entry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/e9a140/32.png) [@Initial\_Entry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Initial_Entry)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2000, 10:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/46 "2000-05-15T10:46:23Z")
I get them from the local merchants all the time. Never seen them discolored though… ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2000, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/47 "2000-10-09T23:40:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Green Bean \* > \*\*I use Sackies all the time now. They pop out of train ticket and Metrocard machines as change. > > I have found that I like them much better than dollar bills. They are just plain easier to use. No folding and unfolding. No checking to make sure the denomination is right. No un-crumpling. Plus, I think that they are less “bulky” than bills. This is a purely subjective thing, but my wallet seems smaller with a bunch of sackies in the change purse than it does with a bunch of singles in the bill compartment. > > I have had no trouble with spending them. No cashier has even looked twice. \*\* I am with you on this. You always hear people say they don’t like to carry lots of heavy coins, but I think it’s worse to have a wad of low value-notes bulking up my wallet and making it hard to fold. And lets face it, $1 is pretty pathetic as a paper denomination; it won’t even get you on the city bus in lots of places. It’s ill-befitting the dignity of a great nation. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2000, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/48 "2000-10-09T23:48:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Arnold Winkelried \* > \*\*LanceTurbo says: > > > [@](#): > > > > \*\* > > Where the hell are these vending machines that accept the Susan B? > > Post offices, train stations, subway stations. \*\* Actually I’ve found that quite a few vending machines accept dollar coins. I work for a large corporation and the vending machine in our local kitchen accepts them. For those wishing to get them the post office vending machines are a good place…just buy one or two stamps with a ten or twenty and the change will come out in dollar coins. Mostly, they’re still Suzies, but I’m getting more Sackies as time goes by. ---
**Author:** ![filthy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/da6949/32.png) [@filthy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filthy)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/49 "2000-10-10T01:38:01Z")
I got 4 in change from the post office. Spent one on a rat for the snake and gave the other 3 to the grandkids. The rat merchant was supprised to see it. The grands were disappointed that it wasn’t green paper. Explanations had to be made to all. ---
**Author:** ![Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Helen\_s\_Eidolon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Helen_s_Eidolon)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/50 "2000-10-10T01:44:17Z")
Looneys and toonies rock… Once I thought I had no money with which to grab a cab home (there were no bills in my wallet) and I found 17$ in change in there! ---
**Author:** ![samclem](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a9a28c/32.png) [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)\ **Post date:** [October 10, 2000, 3:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669/51 "2000-10-10T03:22:27Z")
**Beakeroni** said > [@](#): > > I noticed that all of my Sackies were stained. I presume that they were fairly fresh from the mint…so what’s up with that? Anybody else get discolored coins? The MInt has no experience working with the manganese outer layer that Sackies have. It apparently discolors and spots very easily. They accepted the composition without much thought as it fulfilled their two requirements: color, and identical electro-magnetic properties to the SBA dollar, for which machines had already been programmed. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-new-golden-dollar-anyone-use-one/18669.md?page=2)