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What was it like before the Internet and this Forum?
TahoeDale
Posts: 1,785 ✭✭✭
It sure seems like a long time ago, but I remember most of it.
In 1951, I was 10 years old, and would take the bus to downtown Dallas, go to a Movie theater that showed only one picture at a time, usually sat in the balcony, and saw people smoking --it was still okay.
After the show, we would go to the Planter's Peanuts shop, and then to the only store that sold coins in downtown.
We would look and look and then finally make a serious decision- spending $5 or less on a circulated coin in a cardboard holder.
Hurrying home, the new acquisition would then go into the green Whiman folder, or the blue one. One more hole filled.
I did that for 4 years, til 1955, as High School football and Debate club took over.
Jump forward 37 years to 1992. With a little extra money, I wandered into Pat Johnson's retail store in Houston, Texas. I told Pat that I wanted to start collecting again, and could he put aside about $5000 worth of dollars, and type, for me to get going with.
Also met Kenny Duncan, again at his store/office. US coins wasn't near as big then as they are now, having been in business only 4 or 5 years. Kenny and Paul Montgomery saw I was serious, and they would call me on Mondays, after a show, and I would come in to see what they had bought or gotten thru the auctions at the latest show.
There was no internet, no forums, no images to look at. Just good hard-working dealers in B&M stores. They had the auction catalogs, but I don't think I ever saw one til 1997.
The only people I spoke with about coins was the dealer who would call me with newbies( and I didn't learn that term til 2000.)
Seems a little different today.
In 1951, I was 10 years old, and would take the bus to downtown Dallas, go to a Movie theater that showed only one picture at a time, usually sat in the balcony, and saw people smoking --it was still okay.
After the show, we would go to the Planter's Peanuts shop, and then to the only store that sold coins in downtown.
We would look and look and then finally make a serious decision- spending $5 or less on a circulated coin in a cardboard holder.
Hurrying home, the new acquisition would then go into the green Whiman folder, or the blue one. One more hole filled.
I did that for 4 years, til 1955, as High School football and Debate club took over.
Jump forward 37 years to 1992. With a little extra money, I wandered into Pat Johnson's retail store in Houston, Texas. I told Pat that I wanted to start collecting again, and could he put aside about $5000 worth of dollars, and type, for me to get going with.
Also met Kenny Duncan, again at his store/office. US coins wasn't near as big then as they are now, having been in business only 4 or 5 years. Kenny and Paul Montgomery saw I was serious, and they would call me on Mondays, after a show, and I would come in to see what they had bought or gotten thru the auctions at the latest show.
There was no internet, no forums, no images to look at. Just good hard-working dealers in B&M stores. They had the auction catalogs, but I don't think I ever saw one til 1997.
The only people I spoke with about coins was the dealer who would call me with newbies( and I didn't learn that term til 2000.)
Seems a little different today.
TahoeDale
0
Comments
Prodigy and AOL were big then and my university had its own intranet, but by 1995 or so, the internet was growing substantially, especially as a research tool where I used it doing some undergrad research.
I didn't get back into collecting until after I got married in 2000, had some disposable income and found my childhood collection. It was then that I saw the world wide web as a tool to understanding how much collecting had changed.
It was then that I finally realized I could afford many of those Morgans I lusted after as a child while reading my 1987 Redbook 100's of times over and over, as that and a few other books were my only sources of coin information.
My local coin shop was okay as a source of info, but I only bought foreign coins from them as a kid, and nothing too expensive at that...
"Bongo hurtles along the rain soaked highway of life on underinflated bald retread tires."
~Wayne
CoinAge. Do they even still make that!?
Next, I bet your going to tell us that that there were no Ipods then either.
"WILL TYPE FOR FOOD"
I had a bit of an obsessive personality even back then (still do) and I remember reading about coins all the time - library books, magazines, anything I could get my hands on. I would go to a local flea market once a week and buy a coin or two with my allowance and help from my mom. I bought a few coins from New England Rare Coin Galleries thru the mail and I remember how thrilling it was to get the coins! They seemed so awesome.
After a few years it seemed to me to become more and more of a "me vs. them" situation in which I felt I didn't have any choice but to take the dealer's word for the grade of a coin - whether I agreed or not. ANACS was just starting out but grading was very controversial at the time. I finally gave up and sold my collection to the only dealer in town. I remember thinking that he really gave me less than what I thought the coins were worth and I didn't think very highly of him for a long time after that.
After I started collecting again 25 years later, I became re-acquainted again with that dealer. After learning more about the market and grading nowadays, I realized that he probably gave me a pretty fair price for my coins. I sure couldn't see it back then though.
Coins were and are a fun hobby. But if it weren't for third party grading services, I still wouldn't be a collector.
Thanks for posting it.
<< <i>good thing Algore is smart enough to invent the internet for us so we can have this forum. >>
Good thing Barndog is back
In later years, I spent hours talking to one of the local dealers, who kept newspaper clippings about his connection with Breen, his 43 Lincolns struck on silver. He owned 4 at one time. He was as crusty as they come, and had larceny in his heart, but always had time to talk. It was as much fun as it is now, although it was more difficult to buy mail order without getting hurt.
and it sets us apart from practitioners and consultants. Gregor
<< <i>I'd say an absolute Rape-Fest of the Dealers upon the ignorant, collecting public. >>
This video will give you an idea what buying a coin was like before PCGS.
Sometimes, we drew pictures on the walls to show the designs we wanted to see on coins, if they had been invented and if we knew what coins were. We had lots of bison pictures – they were all over the place – and some other critters and dead people.
The really organized collectors had little piles of dried leaves and in between each leaf was a toe nail they had collected. Some tried to put words underneath to say when the items were made, but since we couldn’t write no body knew how to make numbers or letters.
Collectors from other caves came by once in a while – mostly when they were hungry. And we would talk about our collections and about how bad were the people in the cave on the other side of the valley ‘cause they had done artificial nail toning, and even made fake ones out of mastodon tusks.
Later – I remember it like yesterday – some tall guy named Washington came by and gave us metal disks with a lady’s picture on them. They did not taste good.
<< <i>I'd say an absolute Rape-Fest of the Dealers upon the ignorant, collecting public. >>
Just like it is today
- Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106-43 BC
- Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106-43 BC
<< <i>I'd say an absolute Rape-Fest of the Dealers upon the ignorant, collecting public. >>
That's the way I remembered it. That's why third party grading services became so popular among collectors.
Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not owe.
Go BIG or GO HOME. ©Bill
<< <i>what was it like before the Internet and this Forum? >>
no freely passed knowledge.
no pictures
no comments
no grade inflation
no drama
no fighting
no plastic
no waiting for coins to come BACK from anywhere
no hopes of finding rarities for sale
no biddles bank
no laura
and less Marty and Russ than we had before
no pictures
no comments
no grade inflation
no drama
no fighting
no plastic
no waiting for coins to come BACK from anywhere
no hopes of finding rarities for sale
no biddles bank
no laura
and less Marty and Russ than we had before
I spent a lot of time chasing down coins and researching them in the
1972-1986 (pre slab) era. The knowledge was freely passed, there wasn't all that much of it though. A lot of it was wrong. It took forever to get out books. Writing letters was slow and long distance phone calls cost too much. There was still fighting at the auctions. Alan Hager supplied plastic in the late 1970's but very few drank from that well. Paramount had some Redfield plastic and there GSA's of course.
There was lots of waiting for coins to show up. Since there were no photos you had to wait forever to see the coin. Everything was processed slowly, by check, snail mail, it seemed to take a few weeks. All the while you checked the mail every day only to be disappointed. Some of the coins I sent out on approval took months or one case, 18 months to come back. And those were the "good" guys. Some of them never came back as 3 guys stiffed me via the US mail. My return rate via CW advertisers back then was over 90%, yet I persevered and continued to throw away money on P&H.
No different today imo. 90% of what's offered out there should be walked away from, and quickly.
Rarities were for sale quite often. James A. Stack in 1975, The Apostrophe sales in 1979-1986, Amon Carter 1984, etc. All you had to do was keep an eye on the catalogues. The material that came out in Garrett in 1979-80 was outstanding. Bowers and Ruddy and Stacks pumped out major league coins in their later 1970's catalogues. There was no shortage of great coins, but there was plenty of over-graded trash as well. My first mail bid at the old B&M company resulted in EVERY coin being sent back for being over-graded. While Bruce Lorich was unhappy with that, they had also stiffed me in the previous sale when I was high mail bidder but a floor bidder got the coin at 60% of my bid! They suggested I never bid blind again and I agreed. It was 12 years before I bid with them again. Bidding blind in auctions back then was like ebay today.
From 1980-1982 the market died and little neat stuff showed up. I took a 3 year vacation from buying coins (late 1979 to mid-82). It was clear that prices were headed to the toilet. Since there were no slabs, dealers kept price guides about the same but compensated by requiring much more coin to meet gem status. If you had a gem65, they'd call it a choice BU. Bargains appeared in summer of 1982. Now that was a time to buy. When Gene Edwards passed and his seated coins were consigned to the 1982 ANA it was like picking low hanging fruit. A gem 1844-0 quarter for $4400? An 1856-0 for $2000? Too bad I didn't have the money to buy those.
But in 1983 I was able to buy my first gem New Olreans quarter, an 1858-0 (only $4300). By 1989 those coins went up 5-10X in price.
To my knowledge only the 56-0 is not still the finest known (and it's in either 2nd or 3rd position today).
I don't know if there was biddlesbank "news" but he was not missed. Seemed that there were more newsletters back then. Bruce Amspacher's Bear report, David Hall's "Inside View", and many others. My favorite Inside View was DH's "100-1 Moon Shot" call on the upcoming boom market....this was 1983-84. While the liftoff never quite reached 100-1, there was quite a big bang in 1988-89.
Laura was around in the era, I was not aware of her until the mid-80's. Note that unless you scoured the auction scene or had a club
(LSCC for example), it was hard to know who you were competing against. I was keenly aware of Kam Ahwash, Bill Grayson, Gene Edwards and other seated guys due to the club publishings. I kept a low profile back then. And if not for Al Gore today, I'd probably still be very low profile. Other than attending an occasional ANA show when it hit NY or Boston, or a Baltimore, I rarely left the local coin scene. Attending NERCA and Stack auctions during that time helped a lot to figure out what was what. Even in the 70's, superb coins brought 2X and 3X premiums to CDN gem bid. It was the start of high end grading.
While there was less (or no) Russ and Marty, Disney provided us with "Spin and Marty" as a substitute.
In general, the market was like the Wild West in those times. There were probably more sheisters and crooks than legitimate dealers. The FTC came in during the mid-1980's and started tossing people in jail. I think this was the primary reason that PCGS was created, to clean up the mess before the FEDs did.
roadrunner
<< <i>no freely passed knowledge.
no pictures
no comments
no grade inflation
no drama
no fighting
no plastic
no waiting for coins to come BACK from anywhere
no hopes of finding rarities for sale
no biddles bank
no laura
and less Marty and Russ than we had before
I spent a lot of time chasing down coins and researching them in the
1972-1986 (pre slab) era. The knowledge was freely passed, there wasn't all that much of it though. A lot of it was wrong. It took forever to get out books. Writing letters was slow and long distance phone calls cost too much. There was still fighting at the auctions. Alan Hager supplied plastic in the late 1970's but very few drank from that well. Paramount had some Redfield plastic and there GSA's of course.
There was lots of waiting for coins to show up. Since there were no photos you had to wait forever to see the coin. Everything was processed slowly, by check, snail mail, it seemed to take a few weeks. All the while you checked the mail every day only to be disappointed. Some of the coins I sent out on approval took months or one case, 18 months to come back. And those were the "good" guys. Some of them never came back as 3 guys stiffed me via the US mail. My return rate via CW advertisers back then was over 90%, yet I persevered and continued to throw away money on P&H.
No different today imo. 90% of what's offered out there should be walked away from, and quickly.
Rarities were for sale quite often. James A. Stack in 1975, The Apostrophe sales in 1979-1986, Amon Carter 1984, etc. All you had to do was keep an eye on the catalogues. The material that came out in Garrett in 1979-80 was outstanding. Bowers and Ruddy and Stacks pumped out major league coins in their later 1970's catalogues. There was no shortage of great coins, but there was plenty of over-graded trash as well. My first mail bid at the old B&M company resulted in EVERY coin being sent back for being over-graded. While Bruce Lorich was unhappy with that, they had also stiffed me in the previous sale when I was high mail bidder but a floor bidder got the coin at 60% of my bid! They suggested I never bid blind again and I agreed. It was 12 years before I bid with them again. Bidding blind in auctions back then was like ebay today.
From 1980-1982 the market died and little neat stuff showed up. I took a 3 year vacation from buying coins (late 1979 to mid-82). It was clear that prices were headed to the toilet. Since there were no slabs, dealers kept price guides about the same but compensated by requiring much more coin to meet gem status. If you had a gem65, they'd call it a choice BU. Bargains appeared in summer of 1982. Now that was a time to buy. When Gene Edwards passed and his seated coins were consigned to the 1982 ANA it was like picking low hanging fruit. A gem 1844-0 quarter for $4400? An 1856-0 for $2000? Too bad I didn't have the money to buy those.
But in 1983 I was able to buy my first gem New Olreans quarter, an 1858-0 (only $4300). By 1989 those coins went up 5-10X in price.
To my knowledge only the 56-0 is not still the finest known (and it's in either 2nd or 3rd position today).
I don't know if there was biddlesbank "news" but he was not missed. Seemed that there were more newsletters back then. Bruce Amspacher's Bear report, David Hall's "Inside View", and many others. My favorite Inside View was DH's "100-1 Moon Shot" call on the upcoming boom market....this was 1983-84. While the liftoff never quite reached 100-1, there was quite a big bang in 1988-89.
Laura was around in the era, I was not aware of her until the mid-80's. Note that unless you scoured the auction scene or had a club
(LSCC for example), it was hard to know who you were competing against. I was keenly aware of Kam Ahwash, Bill Grayson, Gene Edwards and other seated guys due to the club publishings. I kept a low profile back then. And if not for Al Gore today, I'd probably still be very low profile. Other than attending an occasional ANA show when it hit NY or Boston, or a Baltimore, I rarely left the local coin scene. Attending NERCA and Stack auctions during that time helped a lot to figure out what was what. Even in the 70's, superb coins brought 2X and 3X premiums to CDN gem bid. It was the start of high end grading.
While there was less (or no) Russ and Marty, Disney provided us with "Spin and Marty" as a substitute.
In general, the market was like the Wild West in those times. There were probably more sheisters and crooks than legitimate dealers. The FTC came in during the mid-1980's and started tossing people in jail. I think this was the primary reason that PCGS was created, to clean up the mess before the FEDs did.
roadrunner >>
thats a great post
Go BIG or GO HOME. ©Bill
60 years into this hobby and I'm still working on my Lincoln set!
<< <i>Watch this video it will give you an idea what is was like from a dealers perspective. >>
Thanks for the link! Its a long video, but very informative and entertaining!
<< <i>
<< <i>I'd say an absolute Rape-Fest of the Dealers upon the ignorant, collecting public. >>
Just like it is today
That rape-fest has extended to the ignorant public...just look at the bogus sales on the 'bay.
For the average collector with a little effort and guts, there's a chance of making some money. Look at the cottage industries created by the guides of recent years, Cherrypickers and Bowers' book on upgrading. Look at the ground gained on Registry sets. There's a market for every coin.
And of course, the largest coin dealer of all has more products than ever. It wasn't too long ago when all one could get from the Mint is Proof, Unc sets (25 years).
Ren
Waiting for Coin World and the next major coin catalogue was about the most exciting thing next to a regional coin show coming to one's area. Coin World was the "news" or internet of its day. My "inner coin circle" probably consisted of only 2 or 3 people. Far different today.
roadrunner
My grey matter and wallet are truly thankful.
Phone calls and mail bids for auctions were all I could keep up with.
Going to the internet was a great challenge for many folks.
Now a person had to keep up with the old ways and learn the new ways as well.
This is something I wrote for my 1000th post years ago and thought it fit here.
Sunday June 22, 2003 11:30 AM
Wow, have I had a great time here. After almost 40 years of collecting I joined the old board and later came over to the new. I thought I knew as much as anyone about the hobby. Man was I wrong. I felt humbled in a hurry.
The learning never stops. The last 20 or so years have been the biggest challenge to keep up. It has been flat out daunting for some including myself. Not in any order here are some of the things that have amazed me.
When computers started showing up in average folk’s homes I thought, no big deal this is easy. Dial the number, put the handset in the cradle and off you go. Remember basis and line #s? What’s a gig? Then came collecting programs, email, HTML, HTTP, scanners, digital Cameras, posting images, burning Cd's, EBay, online buying and selling, Paypal and of course this forum.
Books came out right and left on coin types. Breen’s book, (could keep a person busy), Accujoke, David Bowers works and Cherrypicker’s.
The grading services and all the rules. What’s PVC and Pop reports? Grading moderns MS65-70 for all the different types. Never thought many would care that much if a coin was a 66 or a 69. Wrong again.
Fun just doesn’t describe it. It’s been a great ride with something new to learn every day and few regrets. I can’t even imagine what the young folks will see happen in our hobby.
When I start to post a complaint about our board, I think of just how good we really have it. I remember when I had no one to share the hobby with.
Now we all have a great place. This Board.
-------------------------
Larry
Wow, that was way cool in the early 90's
I had an 496 IBM with a CD-rom in it
128 meg hard drive that a computer geek friend of mine said I would "never" fill up
Jim
Menomonee Falls Wisconsin USA
http://www.pcgs.com/SetRegistr...dset.aspx?s=68269&ac=1">Musky 1861 Mint Set
Those that choose to learn and do their homework do well.
Those that choose to give up their own thoughts and put blind faith in others (eg-BELIEVING EVERY SLABBED COIN IS CORRECTLY GRADED) many times lose.
D'OH
P.S. .... Although I always talk about those darn lemmings that drink that sugary stuff around here...there are some sellers out there that abso-freakin-lutly LOVE YOU.
QUESTION: When did the Bid Boards disappear from coin shops, and how were they run? I remember them from 1970 or so, but don't remember how they were operated.
Thank you!
I remember my father buying me a 1909 VDB in 1975 (not the S-VDB) for $3.50 and thinking he must have emptied his bank account to pull that one off.
Then Gore said, "Let there be light"; and there was light.
...with apologies to the original author.
<< <i>
<< <i>I'd say an absolute Rape-Fest of the Dealers upon the ignorant, collecting public. >>
This video will give you an idea what buying a coin was like before PCGS. >>
great video
I give away money. I collect money.
I don’t love money . I do love the Lord God.
Back in the 70s, I remember waiting for the "Rare Coin Review" from Bowers and Ruddy and the "Collector's Cabinet" from William's Gallery to show up. Now that I think on it, times were pretty boring back then with no internet sites and no forums.
Just goes to show you brothers, sometimes change is a good thing.
In 1965, a coin shop opened up in the neighborhood shopping center (they weren't called "malls" back then). They had a good selection of uncirculated and proof type coins, most of which I had never seen before, except in books. Unfortunately, those were beyond my budget at the time, but they also had an extensive stock of BU rolls, and I began buying single coins from those rolls. I would just tell them the dates that I was interested in buying, and they would pull the roll and I could take my pick of any coin. I assembled complete sets of Lincolns (from 1934-1964, with many pre '34 dates mixed in), Jeffersons, Roosevelts, Washingtons from 1941-64, and Franklins. By the time I was 25, I had all of the U.S. coins mintage since 1940, with 3 or 4 exceptions. During those years, I was also acquiring older coins, as my budget allowed.
When I was ready to buy my first house, I went to a coin shop to sell some of my duplicates so I could come up with a down payment. They were impressed with my collection and my knowledge, and offered me a part-time job, which I accepted. This was when gold and silver prices were heating up in 1979. It was sad to see some of the coins and other objects people sold for scrap being sent to the smelter. I found some "keeper" coins in the bags of 90% silver coins that we sold by the dozens each week. I also saw and held some amazing type coins - I remember having 2 $4 stellas in the shop at the same time, also 2 Continental dollars, a beautiful glossy R&B 1794 large cent, proof trade dollars and proof gold - well, it seemed like the perfect job, and eventually I went to work there full time. That lasted almost 4 years, and I never tired of seeing nice coins (except perhaps Morgan dollars
After that, I attended coin shows and in 1987 bought my first PCGS slabbed coin. In 1990 I began buying through a relatively new company called Teletrade. There were no pictures, and descriptions, if any, were sketchy, so I ended up with some dogs, but also many very nice coins. I remained in that pattern until I discovered the internet in 1998. Things definitely have not been the same since then! Most neighborhood coin shops are long gone (thanks to eBay), and nearly everything I purchase (other than U.S. Mint offerings) is slabbed.
Jim
<< <i>QUESTION: When did the Bid Boards disappear from coin shops, and how were they run? I remember them from 1970 or so, but don't remember how they were operated. >>
Basically, any prospective buyer or seller needed to register with the store. Sellers could put up whatever they wanted to sell onto little cards. Buyers could then write down their bids up until auction close (not unlike eBay). There would then be a relative madhouse as people paid for the coins they won and sellers would be paid (minus the auction fee).
Most bid boards seem to have ended about the time silver started skyrocketing in the early 80s and coin stores installed bulletproof teller windows and hired armed security guards.
60 years into this hobby and I'm still working on my Lincoln set!