Aruban Coins

**jaceravone** · 05-25-2009, 10:40 PM

My wife and I just celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary down in Aruba and while we were there, I convinced her to go with me to see Aruba's Numismatic Museum.

The museum was in a fairly decent part of town, but as we walked up, we got the strange feeling that nobody was home, nor had there been anyone there for some time. I actually started to get bummed out, because I had been really looking forward to this little visit. Once we approached the door, there was a sign that said please push buzzer for entrance.

We were greeted by the curator of the museum who worked there by himself. His father-in-law was the person who started the museum over 50 years ago and was a very well respected and honored person on the island. He had passed away several years ago, and he had decided to keep the museum open and try to follow in his footsteps.

You could tell that a lot of time had been put into building the museum. It was not the Smithsonian by any means, but given the location and apparent lack of interest on the island, it was still impressive. Although I was expecting a museum filled with coins dating back to the 16 and 1500's, there was much more to be seen. They had put together a worldly collection of all coins and paper currency. So even though you had a small section of the museum dedicated to Aruban numismatic history, there was even a larger portion that was filled with coins from all over the world. Of course I was thoroughly impressed with all the early silver and gold from the Spanish and Portuguese armadas. All the way in the back of the building was this gentleman's work station. He had surrounded himself with numismatic books and magazines from all over the world. He was proud of this as he was digging through showing me his Standard Catalogs of World Coins and many issues of the Numismatist along with other numismatic publications. He was basically teaching himself from scratch.

He had these wonderfully built display cases where there was a glass top, then about 10 drawers underneath that when pulled out exposed other glassed covered sections that were filled with coins. Each one of these display cases were nicely labeled with each country of origin. It was basically a Standard Catalog of World Coins up close and personal.

Anyway, it was a pleasant tour and I could tell that my wife had been ready to leave 5 minutes before we even got there, so we said our good buys and left. Here is a bit of advice to anyone..... when doing something like this.....make sure you do it alone unless of course your significant other is really into coins, then thats ok. I wish I had more time to spend there, because there was so may neat things to look at. So it gives me something to look forward to if I ever travel down there again.

It wasn't until afterwards that my wife asked me why I didn't take any pictures inside. I told her that they probably weren't allowed, but we never did see any signs. So I have two pics for you. Sorry. But please stay tuned for part 2 of my story.

Welcome to Coin Talk! Register Now, it's easy and FREE!