dumbest thing you've ever done

About two months ago I bought a pretty nice 1889O Morgan on ebay. It arrived in a nicely stapled 2x2 cello. As I keep all my Morgans in airtites I proceeded to pull apart the 2x2 without removing the staples. I have always been careful doing it this way and had never had any problems, until I heard and felt the staple scrapeing across the face of the coin. You can't believe how deep a scratch just the weight of a Morgan Dollar will make as it drags across a sharp staple end. Lesson learned and one .49 staple remover purchased.

 

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I thought that was merely estrogenical ?

 

oh man....

 

Don't feel alone, I did the same thing. I'm just glad that i bought up the silver that i did when it was reasonable.

 

So, you know her? [the first wife.]

 

LOL

 

Back somewhere around 1980 there was an increase in the price of gold and silver. My grandfather passed away and I ended up with a gallon jar full of silver dimes. There were Rosie's but I do remember most of them were Merc's. My son had just been born and we were going through a rough patch. I ended up selling the coins for their melt value. I never even really looked close at what was in there (nor did I have the knowledge). The money helped for a while but now I could throw up when I think about it.

 

mark:
Sure you are upset, but...even today you couldn't get the price that you got back then.
And eating was probably kinda important then.
Don't look back, I often do -- with regret, and then it just ruins my day.

 

the worst mistakes i made in collecting were when i first started out in early 80's. i would purchase coins w/o any focus to a set or collection. would purchase anything from colonial paper and coins to silver certificates and silver and gold bullion. i wou;d try and buy "bargain" coins...finding out later they were cleaned, or ovegraded, or even damaged(wow..i didn't know a rim ding was damage!). as i got deeper in the hobby, i started reading books and learning. taking courses, and gathering info. it refined my purchases and decisions immensely. when you hear people talk about buying the book before the coin, it is the wisest advice you can get in this hobby......steve

 

The worst mistake I ever made was acting as the ground when cleaning the battery terminals in my car. :O Big blue spark, didn't feel to good for a little while. LOL

Fortunately, I'm terrified of making a mistake with buying coins, so I'm probably too cautious when buying coins, and haven't made any big mistakes in my coin collecting..... yet.

 

Ack!! I feel your pain... I just use a big heavy pair of scissors and cut the suckers right off, cardboard and all.

 

Ouch! How long did it take for your hair to grow back?

 

Way, way back when I was a kid and collected coins, if I showed my collection to anyone they would always say, those sure are dirty, why don't you clean them. And I did. Every coin I collected I cleaned. Now as a really smart kid in chemistry, although about 8 years old, I knew enough that Baking Soda and water solutions would clean Copper. If that didn't work, a turkey baster could take out some Batery Acid from my Dad's car battery and that sure did clean the coins much better. Of course when caught taking that acid the results hurt where I sit. I did this with an entire completed Lincoln Cent collection. Of course back then a completed set was from 1909 to about 1948 but it did include the 09S VDB, 14D, 22 plain, etc.
Just think if I had the money to go out and buy that brand new book about coins that just came out called the Red Book. However, $1.50 was a lot of money then. Lots of candy for that.

 

Dumbest thing I have done? Not buying gold 3 years ago.

 

lol...i dont think i should even respond to this post..

 

Why don't you just limit it to dumb things you have done in the last month?

 

Dumbest was about 28 years ago I bought an 1869/8 Indian Head cent from a dealer, and sent it in to ANACS for auth/grading. It came back authenticated, but as an 1869/9. I thought at the time that it was a separate overdate, so I returned it to the dealer and he refunded my money.

 

Dumb... I bought an 1895-O Morgan $1 graded fine on the Bay. I Won the auction for $50 + shipping. When I got the coin it had a tiny initial beneath the wing.Not being able to foresee the future I sent it back for a refund. Needless to say, Big Mistake. Even with the tiny scratch it is now worth 5-6 times what I paid for it. Oh yeah, I never refilled that hole either. Dumb

 

dready:
Um.....
Could that have been an initial "M"?
That was the designer's initial.

 

Wish it was I would have kept it. T under 1 wing , J under the other