I pulled this out of an old Whitman album. What is it about them that tends to cause toning like this? Something on the coin when it was stored?
That particular coin looks to have led a rough life, and yes, there was likely something applied to it. I've not seen cents turn those colors normally in an album. However, the album itself can cause toning to occur. Paper is made with a wide variety of chemicals, and those can sometimes cause toning. Depending on how old your album is, it may contain sulfur, which is the primary toning agent for most coins. Newer albums are made from archival quality papers, and so should not cause toning.
album is a 60 year old whitman(the kind with obverse and reverse visible), and the cent was in there since he put it in there in the 60's.
Back in the early 1980's I purchased a 1960 Whitman Mercury book that was maybe a third filled. Same kind of book where you can view both sides of the coin. You can easily pick out the dimes that were in that book since 1960 because they all have that ugly black tarnish ring all around the perimeter of the dime. I love those old Whitman books. They remind me of being a coin happy kid. But they sure are destructive to our coins when they are kept in those books any length of time.
Sometimes album toning can be nice, but like most natural toning, often it isn’t. That’s why the naturally toned pieces that are very attractive can be quite expensive.
