We are getting toppled

You've made this point before and it's a good one. Just because I don't find modern circulating coins collectible doesn't mean tomorrow's collectors won't feel differently as they come to realize nice specimens of post-1964 U.S. coins are few and far between. Thanks for the thoughtful rebuttal.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

I believe this really does impact on the "growth" of the hobby and the extreme segmentation we see in it. Most people who do collect modern coins are beginners and they talk about it on social media of various types rather than on message boards where we often older and usually more experienced collectors come.

I don't see this as a good thing but by the same token it is largely inevitable because younger people seem to prefer other media that are more like real time and less formal. Ultimately though beginning collectors aren't going to want to talk about the expensive bust half dollar they just bought on most social media platforms. Some may yet come to the message boards.

All social human endeavor derives from assumptions and discussion of that field. While coin collecting isn't "social" per se it certainly is as a hobby. Even the most independent individualist must deal with other collectors to find and acquire items for his collection. We discuss coins and learn what others collect and why. We appreciate the effort and passion that goes into a collection even where we have no interest in the items collected. Coin collecting is not only a hobby and a market but it very much is social as well for most individuals. THIS is where the problem lies; we have a segmented hobby with beginners living in a different virtual world than our own. We no longer communicate through weekly papers and letters to the editor but rather virtually face to face on message boards with news, opinion, and coins at our fingertip just a few key strokes away (or fifty key strokes away if you don't use an Apple).

There's no real solution but I do believe message boards should try to be more welcoming to beginners and intermediate collectors just in case they ever do show up here. All we really need to do is remember virtually everything is collectible. Someone with enough passion could make an interesting collection of the various grains of sand on the beach. Small metal object made by man are a natural for collecting.

I once began a chocolate coin collection but soon discovered the older ones were deteriorating too quickly. They are just too perishable. It was no great loss as the later acquisitions were delicious.

 

So he’s the guy to blame for my CRH obsession

 

Oh one of these things again...

I've been hearing people make claim that the hobby is "dying" for literally my entire life, and well, it's still here. The hobby of coin collecting has been around almost as long as coins, and it will still be around for a long time to come.

If less people are entering the hobby, it just means I'll be able to get coins cheaper with the reduced demand.

I'm not the least bit worried about it.

 

Oh it takes a lot of patience, but you still can. I still find wheat cents where I work almost every day. I hunt boxes of coins from the bank and still find interesting things, including older US coins from time to time. I never stop looking.

 

Or the patient has gotten morbidly obese and needs to lose fifty pounds, so let's start by cutting off their legs.

 

It might never have happened without him.

More likely Mehl was just in right place at the right time. The middle class was growing and more people had more disposable income and more time. The depression was going full blown and he had been trying to popularize the hobby for years by issuing his "Star rare Coin Encyclopedias" which offered high prices for old coins and a staggering $50 for any 1913 V nickel that was only a few years old at the time. Of course he knew he already had all of them. Many people were out of work but had the time and money to collect pennies so he sold lots of penny boards. The hobby shifted from being the province of long hairs to being a mass market with millions and millions of collectors by 1964 when the US Mint killed the hobby. There may never be nearly as many people collecting things like wheat and indian cents as there were in 1964. Today most new collectors do collect things like wheat cents because they are told memorials are "uncollectible" and are more common than grains of sand on the beach. Besides most are from an era that US coins were no longer even made.

Who knows what the world would be like today if not for B Max Mehl. I suspect it would be radically different but one thing is sure; the coin hobby would be radically different. My father probably wouldn't have seen a little booklet issued by the government shortly after the war encouraging parents to interest their children in hobbies like coin collecting and I might never have become interested. I might be the exception who became interested anyway because I paid attention to coins as a means of commerce even before I could talk. Who knows? Lots of coins have been issue by governments and private mints since 1931. Even token and medal production ratcheted higher. There is a lot more aggregate demand for shiny little discs of metal than there once was and they don't even have to be "shiny", disc shaped, or metal. Every household has at least a few lying about.

 

As I stated: "I learned a long time ago, that if someone hasn't "figured it out" yet, an explanation will generally only result in a "Oh, that can't happen"!
A comparable phrase as: "Meh, that has nothing to do with activity here" when a self-help educational solution is provided!
This often results in the nonsensical Gibberish, and a childish post (i.e. ), related to a simplistic understanding of what generates incompatibility of problem solutions/learning/advancement!
My solutions have been written/taught by myself as advanced College Adult Education practices to graduate/employed Engineers who are considering alternates to scientific/personal problems by learning compromise versus ridicule!
The positive feedback from students, relating to divinity, was awesome!
It's believed that uncompromising may be currently replaced by some in solving current impasse!
JMHO

 

Basically why. Among other reasons-site politics and most ive been friendly with either gone or removed- you rarely see this big blonde around much

 

This wasn't pointing anyone out. I do see a lot of what has happened over the years. It's been a whirlwind around here. How does a Site like CT bring back the folks that are longtime members. And those new collectors that asked many questions and kept everyone on their toes.

Is it that high end coins are even harder on the wallet, and PMs have taken over as the want for future stablility.

Good to see Ya, Maine. Glad ya chimed in.

 

Add in just life. Last 4 not been easy especially with what's going on. Cost of living not fun especially in the northeast. Cost of diesel. Just life in general and have been mostly out of numismatics it's totally in the back burner. Especially when one side trying to destroy my freedom and my economics and the other my body autonomy and my right to exist as a human. It's not easy anymore

 

Maybe that's what we did, we started giving them self-help with links and information. They are too smart for us, and they already know it all. If that is so, I hope to see more long-time members show up to share their knowledge.

 

It's not easy for anybody. I was a pocket pull away from ruining the next weekend in Vegas. Almost bought the most beautiful Bryan Dollar today, and it would have dipped too far into Vegas money, heading out for the race on the 15th. I get it, life is happening to everyone. We are all feeling the shakeup.