Missouri 1921 - Why did people do this?

TommyB

I mean, why did people in the past clean coins? This was my Grandfathers, one of two. Both are cleaned, although the photo makes it look worse than to the eye. Is there anything that can be done? What would you do with it? If it were in good shape it would be a nice piece and worth a good amount. Oh well.

FC57Coins

Unfortunately that was the thing to do back then for a lot of people. King Farouk was notorious for scrubbing the heck out of his coins

mbbiker

the last coin i know of that was owned by King Farouk, i think sold for around 7million dollars (i'm going to go scrub my coins now)

FC57Coins

Fortunately that one was not cleaned - when I saw the first headlines about the 33 Double Eagle I gasped and thought "God I hope he didn't clean THAT one!"

mbbiker

Thanks for telling me that i was just about to go get my 33 double eagle and scrub it down and sell it as another King Farouk coin

keets

i think your grandpa did it for a few reasons, but mainly because coins/collecting weren't seen in the same light as today. it's a sad fact that the majority of all mid 1800's coins were cleaned to varying degree's. at least that's what i've read. it was common back then. so i guess maybe your grandad was just carrying on a tradition!! we still clean coins today, though differently and with a little more polished(HEHEHEHE)technique!! heck, we even have a professional service to do it for us and a politically correct name for what they do! the times they are a changin.

i remember when i was a kid, you take a little comet, an SOS pad and a dull penny..............

al h.

Dog97

It looks Mint State and it's hard to fix a MS coin. If it were circulated it could be fixed up to improve it's looks.