The Coin that started it all.......The beginning years.

Hey everyone. I have an unusual thread. I have this coin that I've had since I was a snot nosed kid. It's one of the very first coins that I started collecting. It was given to me by my mentor, my Uncle Alphonse who collected coins/currency and had no kids of his own. He got it while overseas during WW2 and I was so fascinated by his story, that I've held onto it ever since. He didn't go too much into the story of it as he was a man of few words.
Like I said, it's one of the first coins of many that he gave me as payment for chores done around his house as he had his leg amputated below the knee and needed help at times. He got cheap labor, and I got history, coins/currency and enjoyment in the stories that he did tell as most were brief. I suspect he suffered from PTSD (shell shock) although I'm not sure it was called that back then. This coin giving when on until he passed in 1989 and I miss him still.
It's a 1937 British 2 Shilling -George the 6th that he or someone he got it from wore as it is obviously holed. Here is the numista.com link: 2 Shillings - George VI (with 'IND:IMP') - United Kingdom – Numista
If you still have that first coin/s, then do post if you could with a short story if you wish.

 

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I got started collecting Art Bars. The first one was Old Ironsides. The first coin was a Franklin Half from New England Rare Coin Galleries for $10. I don't remember the date or what happened to it.
My first "big" buy was a 1931S Buffalo Nickel for $110 from Joe Flynn in 1980. Sold that on eBay for a whopping $115.50.

 

When I was a teenager my dad one day came home with an old wooden cigar box full of several hundred foreign coins. It was so exciting and as I looked through them. There was one coin that caught my eye and I fell in love with it. I still have the cigar box and the coin which I later sent to have it slabbed. Details Grade but that's okay.. it has sentimental value



Before I sent it..

 

My very first Mint Error discovery.

Another time in 1986, my dad came home with a bucket full of thousands of mixed US Cents. There were Wheats, memorials and steelies.

This one caught my attention. Since I knew absolutely nothing about Mint Errors I put it aside together with some other anomalies. Many were just damaged or altered.
I had labeled it.. the Crater Cent
But it was truly special because later I learned of the description of a Planchet Error called a Lamination

Many years later I sent it to NGC and also received a Details grade. Since I didn't know proper coin handling I had cleaned it with Ajax when I had discovered the Cent



So how did my dad acquire all these coins from? He was a mantinance worker in a building full of retired and wealthy tenants. Anytime they would pass away many of these personal belongings were discarded. He would save items such as the many coins for me to keep.

 

My aunt gave me some coins in 1948 that got me excited. One of them was this 1883.

 

Don't have it with me to show..... One morning the mid 1960's mom handed me a Franklin half to buy my lunch at school. I had never seen anything like that giant half dollar in my tiny hands. I went hungry that day and marveled over that giant coin. I still have it and it was the lit fuse that began a lifelong addiction.

 

Family vacation up in Wyoming many years ago, we stopped at the Buffalo Bill Cody Museum in the city of Cody. In the gift shop there were little bags with an arrowhead and either an Indian head cent or buffalo nickel. I grabbed an 1887 and 1907 Indian along with a 1937 buffalo. Still have the 1887 Indian, I think I have the others still, but they've gotten mixed in with other coins over the years.

 

My Dad was a sometimes collector, so I've been around coins my whole life. I would be hard pressed to remember my first, but since it would have been pre-1964, it probably went into a soda machine shortly after acquisition. I know I got my azz-whacked for taking a few slick Barber's for that exact purpose.

This one however, I purchased for myself during high school. I was amazed at the detail in Chief Iliniwek's face. Amazing diework.

I guess this is what started my exonumia obsession. Coins were boring to me. They all looked the same, and you would be hard pressed to find many with this design detail.

I've had this since around 1974.

Z

 

I am lucky if I can remember what I did yesterday. I don't have a clue as to what started me collecting. But I do remember it was later in life and not as a kid. Probably because as a kid I did not have "extra" money to spend on collectible coins.

 

I bought this 1838 half dime and an 1846 large cent in Good from my mother's cleaning lady. They are both screwed up because I cleaned them when I was kid.



I started out with two Whitman Lincoln Cent coin folders from a Christmas 1959 gift from my uncle. The 13th edition of the Red Book came with them.

I have no idea which Lincoln Cent I pushed into the either of those folders. Traditionally I have considered this surprisingly higher grade 1917-S cent to be that first coin.

 

I've told this story before but I'll tell it again. First coins I ever had were Canadian. Back in 1985 at the tender age of nine we took a family vacation to Gettysburg and Niagara Falls. We went on the Canadian side to see the falls. While in Canada my dad exchanged some currency for spending. After we got home he split the leftover change between my brother, sister, and me. We each got a quarter, dime, nickel, and two pennies. I thought they were the coolest things in the world. Wish I had kept them.

 

I too have told my start before.
I was 5 years old when a class 5 tornado rearranged the farm I was born and living on in 1965. While cleaning up the destroyed trees (I was suppose to pick up leaves and small branches and throw them on the burn pile), I found a small leather purse with some very worn silver quarters and a few wheat cents in it).
To make things sweeter, one of my older brothers got caught telling me the coins were worthless and I should just throw them away. His spanking put the cherry on the top.
In 1967 I got the J.C.Penny Let's Collect Coins Kit for Christmas and the rest is history. James

 

I feel like my entrance to the hobby story is getting very old. I've told it numerous times before.

I was 7 y/o back in '66. My grandmother had an old beaded change purse filled with pre '64 Washington quarters. She also had a few of the old tin Sucrets cough drop boxes filled with Indian head cents, buffalo nickels, and pre '64 Roosevelt dimes. The IHC's and buff nicks were the most intriguing since they were the old style coins. The Washington's and Roosie's were the same style, save for the composition, so those weren't as 'groovy' or 'neat', at that time.

Grandma must have seen my excitement because she gave me the IHC'S. I was hooked. Grandma didn't give me all her coins at once, but she did disperse them all to me over time. None of her other grandkids received any of her coins. They were all given to her first born grand.

The seed was planted and the journey has been lifelong. Thank you, grandma. <3

 

I too had a Oma who had old coins Masterswimmer. You are the only other person I have heard of who got coins from their grandmother. My Oma got most of her coins by stealing the one's she liked from my Opa's card playing. He played pinochole everyday I believe. Yes. Hurray for coin collecting grandmas! James

 

My grandma would have spent them if she was short on cash. She was a product of the Depression so coin collecting would have been absurd to her although she did save Grandpa's coins. She wouldn't even buy her grandkids popcorn at the movies.

 

A friend at school got me started collecting Lincoln cents (all I could afford) when I was 14 years old. I don't know the first coin I put in a folder, but probably no longer have it. I do have a couple of rolls of LWCs from that time period, so I may have it as I might have replaced it with a better one later? But, I do have the first "important" coin that I collected. It's a worn 1912 D "V" nickel. But, it was given to me by my mother. She wore it in her shoe when she and my dad got married November 19, 1930. When my son got married, his bride wore it in her shoe. This is one coin that is definitely not for sale!

 

My grandmother raised 9 children through the depression Rushmore. However she had two factors in her favor.
The first is that when she got married at 16 she had a favorite aunt. That aunt gave her several dozen Seated coins (housed in a wooden glove box) as a wedding present. I got to see and catalog those coins for her and the best part was that many of them were Carson City coins.
Second. My grandfather was meaner than a couple rattlesnakes with their tails tied together but also shrewd.
He bought all the corn he could get at 3 cents a bushel and then held on until the gov. put in price supports. He cleaned up when he sold but like I said he was a mean one. He used that money to buy well over a dozen farms. Many from people who were suppose to be his friends. It is easy for me, or others, to judge but I still can't imagine doing that. James

 

When my wife’s grandmother was near the end she whispered in my wife’s ear to find the loose brick in her fireplace and retrieve the cash she had there. My wife pulled out hundreds in small bills rolled up tight as a toothpick from that fireplace. She too was a product of the depression.

 

My grandma was 18 when the stock market crashed in 1929. Few years later her uncle lost his farm and as a result her dad who worked for him was out of work. He found another job working for another farmer but had to move the family out of state to do so. The farmer who hired him was such a crook no one in the area would work for him even when jobs were scarce so he had to go to a neighboring state to find help. Eventually her dad started working for a nearby farmer whose son married her, my grandpa.

Even though Grandma was an adult by then she wasn't married so she had no choice but to go with them. If it had been up to her she would have stayed in Missouri. She was the type who would open Christmas wrapping very carefully then save it for next Christmas. She also saved used envelopes for scratch paper and write her shopping lists on it. My parents birthdays were one day apart so she would buy one card and give it them. That's how tight fisted she was. I kind of suspect she had PTSD from the Depression.

 

Since we've entered into the whole depression era, I guess I should divulge my grandma and grandpa's foray into some of the most difficult financial times of most Americans.

My grandpa, husband of the same grandma who got me started on coin collecting, was a somewhat well to do entrepreneur in the roaring 20's. He owned his own factory in the garment district of NYC. He employed about 100 designers, pattern cutters, seamstresses, and salespeople. My grandpa financially helped most of his brothers get into their own businesses.

When the depression hit things got tough for everyone. My grandfather was not shielded from the same tough times as the rest of the country. He lost his business. Went broke like so many millions of others. Some of his brothers escaped total ruin due to the businesses they were involved in. When things began to return to post WWII normalcy my grandfather was looking to restart his business. His brothers, the ones he helped get started, all looked the other way. None of them helped him get back on his feet. Did they HAVE to? Certainly not. This led to severing of all contact with his 11 brothers and sisters, and his parents.

Just as a visual to help see the extent of the family size, here's a picture of them.
My Dad, his brother (my uncle), my grandparents, and my great parents (circled).

Both of my great grandparents were alive when I was born, well into my youth. I never met them, or any other brothers, sisters, their spouses, or children, or anyone else in this picture. The only people in the pic that I ever knew were the four people with labels. My grandpa knew how to hold a grudge, till his dying day.

The Great Depression destroyed many families, in more ways than one.