To those of us 60+, do you remember the FIRST TIME you held a Lincoln Memorial Reverse Cent?

ambro51 · January 14, 2015 10:59PM

I do. About a block and a half from home was a tiny neighborhood store. Billy Breders store. There was a mailbox out front. My first little kid errands were walks up to mail a letter. That of course meant a bit of penny candy. ......and I remember getting one, my first one, and looking hard to see Abe sitting in there. Instead of going right home I walked a half block to show it to my Grandmother, who was quite a coin collected herself. .....Ahh childhood memories, a warmth and tear at the same time

ricko · January 14, 2015 11:27PM

Yep.... I saved that one....but like most of my 'saved' coins as a kid, they 'disappeared' when I joined the Navy.......Cheers, RickO

DIMEMAN · January 14, 2015 11:31PM

Sure do and when the Franklin half was retired to make room for the new Kennedy half.

Whit · January 14, 2015 11:48PM

Good morning, everyone:

I am now 60, and I was not numismatically aware at age 5 in 1959. I do, however, remember my first Kennedy half and my first clad coin. And with great longing for the old days, I remember opening rolls of dimes and seeing a sparse smattering of clad reeding among the many, many silvers. It was the clad that was exciting. If only I had known Gresham's law.

Whit

SaorAlba · January 15, 2015 12:15AM

<< <i>Good morning, everyone:

I am now 60, and I was not numismatically aware at age 5 in 1959. I do, however, remember my first Kennedy half and my first clad coin. And with great longing for the old days, I remember opening rolls of dimes and seeing a sparse smattering of clad reeding among the many, many silvers. It was the clad that was exciting. If only I had known Gresham's law.

Whit >>

I open rolls today and see a very occasional silver and get very excited. Indeed, how times change.

roadrunner · January 15, 2015 12:16AM

I was also 5 in 1959 and have no recollection of wheat or memorial cents back then. Too small to register with me back then. But I clearly remember getting a gleaming 1958 Franklin half for my 5th birthday. I was hooked on silver at an early age. The cents didn't catch my attention until the Lincoln cent craze peaked in 1962-1964. I bought those Lincolns high, and later sold them low....lol.

SmallTownCoins · January 15, 2015 12:24AM

I was 7 in 1959 and do not recall the new Cent at all..
I do remember the new Clad Quarter in 1965,
I remember my dad saying it felt "greasy"... :-)

WoodenJefferson · January 15, 2015 12:41AM

When they were released, it was on the national news on our black & white TV but if you were not close to a Reserve Bank it took some time for the new Lincoln Memorial cents to get into circulation in your area. My Dad was the first to bring one home and showed it to me and my brother. It was shiny and when I flipped Mr. Lincoln over, I looked for the 'street car' everyone was saying it looked like...I knew the Lincoln Memorial was somewhere near Washington, but the building did not look like a street car so I was disappointed.

The novelty of a new coin wore off in about 3 minutes.

pocketpiececommems · January 15, 2015 12:43AM

A girl showed a handful to my brother and I at church. She wouldn't trade anything for one.

WaterSport · January 15, 2015 1:26AM

I am 61 and they were already in circulation when I started collecting and roll searching. Gee did I get mad when we got uncirculated rolls of them and heaven for bid, those @#$%^&*() 1964 cents!!!!!! It seemed like that was all the mint could make back then!

WS

Rollerman · January 15, 2015 1:35AM

Sure do! That started myself and a good buddy to start hoarding wheat cents. My Dad saw we were interested in coins and gave me a leather pouch with various old coins in it. The 1837 Large cent in "Fine" really impressed me. That was the springboard that made be a coin collector off and on for over 50 years!
The only bad advice my Dad ever gave me was when he said about the Indian Head Cents in that pouch, "If I were you, I'd clean those up and put them in a coin album of some kind".
Pete

LindeDad · January 15, 2015 2:13AM

Much more interested in other type of tails them.

AUandAG · January 15, 2015 2:59AM

I was collecting cents by age 15 and do not remember my first view of one. However, I must have been
impressed as I saved a few rolls and still have them today.

bob

crazyhounddog · January 15, 2015 3:02AM

Yes, I was in my front yard with my grandmother and the guy next door from our house showed us one he got from the store.

spoilr · January 15, 2015 3:01PM

Got one in change from my jeweler when I paid off my wife's engagement ring in 59.
Don't know where the coin went but I have managed to hold on to the wife.

Skip
Dam! I am getting old.

Bochiman · January 15, 2015 3:28PM

Just wanted to let all of you know....YOU ARE ALL OLD

I wasn't even around when coinage went from silver to clad ......

TopographicOceans · January 15, 2015 3:59PM

I can't even remember last Tuesday

GrumpyEd · January 15, 2015 4:15PM

For the younger collectors that looked for wheaties, do you remember the first time you saw a nice red wheat cent?
For me the minute I saw one I wanted more of them, they look so much nicer than the memorials!

pcunix · January 15, 2015 9:43PM

I was born in 1948 and started collecting in 54 or 55.

I don't remember where I first saw the 59 cent, but I do remember my reaction: ugly, ugly, ugly.

BillJones · January 15, 2015 10:44PM

It was during my pre-collector days, and I was in the fifth grade, but the seeds for me to become a collector already seemed to be in my DNA.

I read that the reverse of the cent was changing in The Weekly Reader which in those days was a four or six page newspaper that was printed for elementary school students. I think the subscription rate was 50 cents a semester. At any rate after reading that article I set out grab every 1959 cent that I could find in circulation. I found probably five or six of them and carried them around in my shirt pocket. I remember losing a couple of them from my pocket while I was running the bases in a pick-up playground baseball game at school.

During that same spring I bought my first medal. The small version of the Delaware Tercentennial celebration at the gift shop in the John Dickenson Mansion, which located outside of Dover, Delaware. I didn't know at the time, but that piece was left over from the celebration that had been held in 1938! I bought it for the original issue price of 50 cents. Today that piece is listed as a So-Called Dollar.

That Christmas my Uncle John gave me the 13th edition of the Red Book and the Whitman cent folders for the years 1909 to 1940 and 1941 to 1959. My real collecting days began with there.

PerryHall · January 15, 2015 11:01PM

I remember my elementary school had a poster on the bulletin board announcing the new cent design with a larger pic of the new reverse. even then I was into coins and looked forward to getting some in change. I also remember the rumors of a design error---the mint forgot to use a capital O in OF.

winky · January 15, 2015 11:23PM

Yes I was in Ogden, Utah. LA, Cal. when the Kennedy half was introduced. Just think sometimes I can't remember my name.

CaptHenway · January 16, 2015 3:06AM

I really can't remember my first Memorial back. Must have gotten started in 1960 when they were already in circulation.

cladking · January 16, 2015 3:52AM

I was already an "old hand" when the memorials showed up. I had nearly two years
of collecting under my belt and my buffalo nickel collection was nearly half done. My
frioends were more excited about the new cent because they collected them and I col-
lected only buffalos in those days. There was almost as much talk about Joseph Stalin's
initials on the new fangled Roosevelt dime as there was about the new penny. In the
newspaper at least one pundit referred to it as the "streetcar penny".

It's hard to fathom that was 56 years ago and that the coin is as unpopular now as it
was then; perhaps moreso. Killing this less than worthless denomination might not even
spur interest in collecting it.

ambro51 · January 16, 2015 8:32AM

<< <i>Just wanted to let all of you know....YOU ARE ALL OLD >>

. Well, maybe. But, we lived through interesting times. Kennedy, the space Race, Hippies, the Beatles....we may be old but the ride has been awesome

ProofArtworkonCircs · January 16, 2015 1:33PM

I remember getting my first Roosevelt dime (1946) at the Barber shop. I remember getting my first Franklin half (1948) from a mint set in 1949. I think my first circulation find was a 1952 in 1955. I still have my first Kennedy half and my first clad. Strangely enough, I do not remember my first memorial cent at all. I know I had them rather early and showed them off to other people.

mustangmanbob · January 16, 2015 11:07PM

All my "firsts" and my collection that I had pulled from circulation were joyfully spent by my little brother while I was attempting to destroy the communist threat at the beckoning of Uncle Sam.

To those of us 60+, do you remember the FIRST TIME you held a Lincoln Memorial Reverse Cent?

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