Early coin collecting experiences
Zoins
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What are some of your very early coin collecting experiences?
One of mine was looking for wheat cents in change. I would find them on occasion and they would be brown. It was pretty fun to find them. Then I got a coin magazine and a Whitman folder full of red, BU wheat cents and it forever changed the way I thought about collecting, both in abundance and in condition.
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More of an investor than a collector as a kid. In 1966 or so I would go bowling on Saturdays. As a couple of the kids would head to the Chinese restaurant afterwards, I went to the bank where they usually had Franklin Halves. I would hand over a buck for two.
Melt on the two coins is about $11.50. Lunch at the restaurant is probably about the same.
Back then though, we didn't worry about salt, MSG, cholesterol or trans fat.
I should have gone with the Egg Foo Young instead.
I looked at 2 circulated Morgans my Mom gave me and thought ...... hmmm I want something BETTER
Blue Whitman folder, living room floor, Dad dumping a bag of pennies on the floor. Realizing real quick the right side was easy to fill and the left side was never going to get filled.
If we were all the same, the world would be an incredibly boring place.
Tommy
This may come across as kind of weird, but I remember being very intrigued and excited in late 1969.
I was anticipating how the new date and decade "1970" would look on the newly minted coins.
It was the first time for me to see a decade rollover (that I could remember, the first time I was too young to realize what was going on) and I was eagerly awaiting it.
Was I a weird kid or what?
Fast forward to 1971 when the Ike's came out.
I was in heaven.
My great uncle had a proof in the brown box and I thought it was the coolest thing I had ever seen.
My Dad gave me a heavily circulated Morgan and I thought the same thing! Of course, I'll always treasure that one.
Ike's were great coins for me. Mine was a blue envelope Ike.
My dad gave me Walkers that he had pulled from circulation, when he was a young man, and a blue Whitman folder to put them in. I was completely fascinated, when I later discovered the early dates from 1916 to 1933 and read about Golden West numismatics in Coin World. After that it was all over.....I was hooked.
Sometimes, it’s better to be LUCKY than good. 🍀 🍺👍
My Full Walker Registry Set (1916-1947):
https://www.ngccoin.com/registry/competitive-sets/16292/
I remember as a kid around 7 or 8 years old, I was playing in the bath tub with a silver Roosevelt dime. I wanted to clean it up by giving it a bath as well. While I was playing with it I was trying to see if it would fit through the small grate on the drain. It did, but as I tried to pull it back out, an edge caught and the dime fell out of my grip, right down the drain.
Great stories, thanks all for sharing !!!
Early 60s, I was a kid in Racine Wisconsin.
During the cold winters, two buddies and I would look through bags of cents from the parking meters. We would get one bag a week and sit at the kitchen table hoping to fill holes in our Whitman albums.
We ultimately also looked at bags of nickels, but we sure had fun with some of our finds. Even found a number of Indian Cents and the occasional V nickel.
“In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock." - Thomas Jefferson
My digital cameo album 1950-64 Cameos - take a look!
As a kid in the early fifties, I had a paper route. I would get all sorts of coins... IHC's, SLQ's, Columbian Halves... and of course, Walkers, Mercs were pocket change. That started my interest in coins, been hooked ever since. Cheers, RickO
Mine started as a kid when I found a few buffalo nickels underneath our old fridge. I was then ecstatic about the chance to find more under the floor planks when we tore down our old garage.
Paper money eventually returns to its intrinsic value. Zero. Voltaire. Ebay coinbowlllc
I recall ( back in the '60s) my mom saying "oh I wish I had a million dollars".
I had 14 other siblings. I remember asking my dad how I could get mom a million dollars.
He pointed me to a magazine with a story about a 1943 Bronze Cent and said "you can start by finding this ". I thought it would be a cakewalk.
I no longer have my parents and only 13 siblings living.
Oh, and I wish I had a million dollars.
I was kicked out of a coin shop for telling the dealer his coins were cleaned!
Early on, I was probably 7 or 8 years old, I remember my dad taking me to Midway coin in Sarasota, FL. Probably around the early to mid 1980's. One day the owner said, "hey kid, check this out" and he reaches into the safe and hands me a Chain Cent in a Capital holder. The same shop used to have 90% junk silver on trays all spread out. I remember how cool all those old silver coins looked! Great memories.
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I spent a week in the hospital when I was a young kid in the mid-60’s. My mother would get rolls of pennies and nickels at the bank and I would fill the holes in my Whitman album.
I started with stamps. Stamps were neat... until I saw coin folders in the school book order forms. Then my grandfather had an accumulation of rolls and rolls of coins pulled from circulation. That helped fill in some of those earlier holes.
I remember looking at the neat designs on the older coins, I loved the walking halves, standing quarters, mercury dimes and buffalos, and thinking how about how neat the designs might be at the turn of the century. In my thoughts at the time they were going to change the design after about 50 years. Well, a dozen years later... I was quite disappointed with that one! There is still no "closure" to a Lincoln set, Jefferson set, Roosevelt set, Washington set or Kennedy set.
I remember looking at the redbook and thinking that proof coins were untouched coins and touching one would make it an UNC. I had no understanding about proof dies and proof strikes! I mean really... the red book had the values for both listed on the same line!
Just a self taught coin accumulator that had no one to show me the ropes. No shops or known collectors in my area. I still have lots to learn and reading the posts here have been a huge help.
Riding my bicycle up to a local coin shop with $27 in Lincoln cents to buy my first Morgan dollar. It was an 1881-S, condition AU, and the year was 1984. I was 10 years old. The anticipation of getting the coin while the owner counted my pennies was very memorable. Ed had a T.V. in his shop, a Pac-man cartoon was on at the time, and his daughter was playing on the floor. Once I had the coin I remember marveling that it was silver, and the look of the edge without clad left me awestruck knowing I had something very special, precious, and different from all the clad coins I had seen in change.
4-5 13-14 year olds cracking cent rolls on the floor looking for anything pre 1934. Occasionally we would pull an Indian head and then as we repacked the rolls, we lamented having to take them back to the nasty bank tellers we had to deal with.
WS
I think he was right in doing so, as the coins were probably whizzed rather than cleaned
I was lucky, I guess. Most of the tellers were very nice to me.
They would even save coins for me to look at.
I was a "stamp guy" when I was a kid, so have no real coin memories....except:
My brother had a Lincoln Cent folder. I would go through my cents looking for "S" mint coins, because they were tough to find in Minnesota (apparently). Then I would sell them to my brother for 2cents each.
Added: Oh my God! That means I was a slimy dealer!
my uncle got me started on canadian halfs t the time which i still like and thats what got me stArted. of course we branched out to the us side
Many years ago my older sister bought me a Lincoln Cent folder, which she helped me fill with pennies from circulation. Very fun project. Until that time, I hadn't even noticed that coins had dates and mint marks. Of course, I dipped them ALL in Mom's copper cleaner to give them that 'fresh, newly minted look' collectors demand!
Dave
Indiana State Fair - 1966
As an 11 year old from the country, I amazed at the rides, food, and vendors. Found a 1 1/2" medal dated 1816 and the dealer only wanted $5! It looked like it was just minted! Looked like this:
https://www.etsy.com/listing/490493992/vintage-1816-1966-indiana?gpla=1&gao=1&&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopping_us_c-art_and_collectibles-collectibles-coins&utm_custom1=13d985d8-5e83-49b1-9867-5ae2c81b5cf5&gclid=Cj0KCQjw9NbdBRCwARIsAPLsnFaNDXLyIdftSCXgcKqcl4x5q44hK1ClvB9_mJ3TVSXn22mnSavGTkMaAsXxEALw_wcB
Not just one, but he had dozens! Better buy one before he realizes his mistake.
When I got home, I flipped it over and saw "1816-1966",
It was just minted.
Good stories in here!
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About 1961 or 1962 I rode about 20 miles ,with my Grandparents, to visit my Great Aunt and my two cousins. My Great Aunt had a dress shop ( It was dark and dreary and I don't think she had any new merchandise in 20 years ) in the little town. My cousin's Grandfather was the Cashier of the local National Bank located two or three doors down the street. My cousins also collected coins. They went down to the bank and brought back a $200 bag of nickels. There was a wooden counter in the shop. The three of us climbed on top of the counter and dumped out the bag. We searched for nickels for our Jefferson and Buffalo Nickel Whitman folders. The bag had lots of buffaloes in it. I am the only one of the three of us still collecting coins. Those were great days!
I would have been about 5 and I was the youngest of six kids.
Dad would get bags of wheat cents and have us kids sort by date and mintmark.
I remeber plenty of Ike’s in circulation in Idaho in the 1970s and 80s. SBAs and Kennedys actually circulated quite a bit too.
I bought a mint set of SBAs after having no luck finding a 1980 in circulation, LOL. That was the first of maybe 6 things I’ve ever purchased from the mint.
State fair in about 1976 they had vendors there and I found someone selling large cents for $6 each. I bought the oldest one I could find in the tray - an 1822. I was just thrilled to own a coin 154 years old. I had started collecting when I was about 5-6 when my dad came back from SE Asia in the military - the seeds of my collection are a handful of Viet-Namese coins and paper money and some MPC's that missed a C-Day when my dad was out in the field.
Roughly about that same time, ca. 1976 my grandfather gave me a coin he was given when he was six years old and had saved until he gave it to me when he was 85 - an 1867 2 cent piece that his brother had given him in 1897 when he came back home after having his finger amputated in a corn shucker. I still have the coin and it is one of my most precious pieces.
Dad took me to a coin shop when I was a kid to shut me up. I saw an ancient Roman coin in my limited budget and wanted it. Dad said are you real sure, I said yes and bought it. I was feeling pretty good about it and bragging. Dad didn't collect, but said turn it over and look closely. I saw copy stamped on it and was crushed. I asked Dad why he didn't stop me from buying it. He said, to teach you a lesson. Well I learned. Still have it to remind me to be careful.
Our science teacher in the 60's would take a half dollar and dip it in Mercury and presto make it uncirculated or so he said. Guess he didn't know about Mercury.
Lafayette Grading Set
.....and I'll bet you were right!