A couple years ago, before I was really into collecting on a large scale I bought this 1856 Large cent for a type set. When I had it in hand I thought it was the prettiest coin I'd ever seen, and I decided to start compiling a Large cent collection, (I now own over 160 large cents, one set that's about 85% complete and another about 60%) That was what really got me started collecting bigtime and now I'm incurable... I'd love to see your coin(s) that got you started and made you decide to go all in!
I love Large Cents ever since I found my First One 21 years ago Metal detecting . I was so nervous digging up this great looking coin . Now I own several nice examples.
Mine was a VG WL half dollar my mom had in an old plastic "bank" under her bed. I quickly figured out how to burglar it so I could see this coin over and over. When she passed away, that little cheap bank with the half in it was all I wanted from her possessions.
I started off with wheaties,finding them in circulation and in my mothers huge jar of cents I found 300 total and it got me hooked.Eventually my uncle started giving me coins my favorites an 1889 morgan dollar AU and a worn 1925 peace dollar from my grandfather in the first year and I've been an insane silver dollar collector ever since. Will this be the year he gives me the 1909S v.d.b that's been in our family for a century.
The first coin in my collection. My brother found it on the floor of a bank in 2015 and it eventually ended up in my hands. Looked up about it online and became obsessed with numismatics. Here's the pic.
There were several that came along one way or another in a short span...a few of them in one "lot" from a great aunt: a 1928 Lincoln...brown/circulated, nothing special, and age-wise only 30 years-old at that time in 1958...but I already liked numbers and symmetry and old-things of history, plus it was the oldest dated thing I had ever seen, and it just grew from there. Then there was an 1847 Large Cent, circulated but quite decent with no marks, etc., a 1902-S Barber 50c, better than most heavily-worn examples, and an 1890-O Morgan, only around VG, but the neatest thing I had ever seen.
No idea really what my first coin was that got me started, but I am sure it was actually hand me down Whitman folders that kicked it off for me from my Aunt, she had a bunch of them, she gave them to me stripped out and empty. I was like 7 at the time I started, maybe a little younger, it had to have been a wheat cent though, as those were the easiest to come by for a 7 year old, searching piggy banks and grandma's coin jar and stuff in like 1980 or so. I think I'd really have to go through everything I have and see if anything strikes me with a memory of it being with me from so long ago. I don't think I can identify a particular coin, but no doubt at all the folders are what got me started. Been circulation hunting ever since.
I no longer have the coin, but when I was a kid I once got an Indian Head cent in change from the ice cream man. I had to ask my Dad what it was. This was in the early 1960s. Ironic story because I lost my Dad exactly 40 years ago today.
Sorry for your great loss those many years ago. The coin was a marker in time that you didn't realize till later. BTW I found an Indian Head in my change back around the same time. I knew what it was and couldn't believe it! There's more to this "hobby" then we realize.
