What's the coin that pulled you from "buying silver" into actually collecting?

I'll admit I came into this from the stacking side — buying ounces, watching spot, treating it as weight. But somewhere along the way a coin stopped being metal and started being an object: the design, the date, the little die quirks, the history behind why it looks the way it does.

For me it's been the early Seated stuff lately — I stumbled into a thread on the no-stars half dimes and couldn't stop looking at that clean open obverse. Something clicked and now I'm reading up on varieties I had no interest in a month ago.

So I'm curious how it happened for the collectors here. Was there one specific coin — a type, a date, an error, something you inherited — that flipped the switch from "I own silver" to "I collect coins"? And do you remember the moment, or did it creep up on you?

Post the coin if you've still got it. Always more fun with pictures.

 

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I was a coin guy long before I was a silver stacker. My momma handed me a big Franklin half to buy my school lunch with... I went hungry that day and been eat up with coins ever since. I was a poor coin guy most all my life. I had too many mouths to feed to indulge myself in fine specimens but that was fine by me. Every coin I held told me stories of the wild west, stock market crashes or great wars. Coins were my storybooks...... I didn't allow myself to indulge in better coins until I was an old man. The coin in my avatar was among the earliest of the finer pieces I was able to acquire from a fellow here named @C-B-D and since then I too have been eat up with the seated series.

 

Well said. Same here, except it was my grandmother who bestowed some Indian Head cents upon me. I think she enjoyed my enthusiasm as much as I enjoyed the coins. As the years progressed she started giving me more of the nickels, dimes and quarters she used to keep in old Sucrets tins.

So no conversion from stacking silver to collecting coins here.

 

I was never really a "stacker" but did have silver and silver coins.

But I really got into aesthetics with the 2012-S Enhanced and Reverse Proof Silver Dollar. They really look nice.

 

I started in 1974 collecting silver art bars. And it was "actually collecting." There was a lot of sneering going on between bar collectors and coin collectors. Made Letters to the Editors in the pubs actually interesting. A few truly deluded demanded the pubs stop carrying ads for art bars.

I believe my first actual coin buy was a Franklin Half for $10. Don't recall the date. Got it from New England Rare Coin Galleries.

David Schenkman once said that collectors who start out in Exonumia will usually go into coins for awhile. Then they'll leave coins and come back to Exo. He was right.

 

Much like you sir. Mine was a WL half my mom had in a little plastic bank when I was a kid. I broke into it almost every day just to look at it. When she passed, that was the only thing I wanted from her house was that little bank.

Anyway, because of this I used to buy junk silver like WL halves, Mercury dimes, junk silver dollars, etc. That was my major pm holdings for a long time while I was poor. To this day that is most of my silver, with the only change being having kids and buying modern animals and superman silver coins for them. Once I got more money, (last 15 years really), I bought gold I always wanted to own but could never afford, but always in coin form, (world gold, US classic gold).

So those are really my pm holdings, coins I bought right around pm value. So I am kind of backward OP from bullion to coins in a way since I have always liked the coins I buy, but they happened to be at bullion value. Now I collect ancients mainly for my attention, but if silver, gold and platinum are at levels I consider reasonable I still like buying more of these. Problem is silver is not very condensed. I am running out of room in the safe I store silver, (gold and PT go into SDB).

 

I've always been a coin guy first. I got started when I found a U.K. Six Pence in my coin bank. A few years ago I discovered exonumia and I don't see myself leaving it for a long, long time or maybe ever.

 

I guess the poll is restricted to those that were ever a silver stacker, which is not me. Like other replies, I've only ever been in it for the collecting aspect. Piling up silver just for the sake of bullion never seemed very interesting to me.

 

I have a hard line between collecting and stacking silver. Neither have an effect on the other. Silver is just a play ground for me. Something for my collection will be silver but not something that silver value is a factor.

 

My father's career took him to several different countries. He would bring me a coin from his travels and that started my life long numismatic experience, I am forever grateful and on my own now, my parents are in heaven awaiting my arrival, I hope, God willing!

 

I started retaining/collecting circulated coins as a kid.
I graduated from random to old pour silver, old silver and gold coins.
Probably should have concentrated on weight but I have some cool vintage stuff.

 

I collected coins first, before stacking which started after the US MINT started making ASE and AGEs. I don't stack bars.

 

Well I was I did about the same - in late 60's early 70's it was pulling wheat cents and older nickels out of circulation with dad and brother. That went on until I graduated college - then me and dad were stacking everything the mint sold just about. Silver, platinum and gold eagles - I had a lot of them all straight from the mint. I made a bunch of money selling when both gold and platinum was around 2k. At that point I kind of quit being a stacker. I also took up taking all those wheats cents and put them in an album - bought the key dates need and completed the album. Just recently I got around to doing a Jefferson nickel book from 38 to like 2004(whatever the whitman folder is). It is complete except for about 10 coins and what is real funny - my last trip to the coin store I got a 40S in change that went into the album.

 

I should add, when I was a youngster I didn't "collect" pennies, dimes, nickels, etc
But I basically rolled many of them and just kept them.
I didn't search for anything, just hoarded them.
So I have a bunch of really "unsearched" penny rolls, etc .. maybe sooner or later I'll go through them (but I doubt it).

I never got into varieties, etc. For instance for Peace dollars I just collected at least one of each year. For dimes my "collection" is going back for each dime's design back as early as possible. Same for half cents, cents, nickels / half dimes, dimes, 20, 25, etc.
I have a few Morgans and started looking at all those VAMs, but thought that was crazy so I only have a handful of Morgans.
For me it was collecting history and in certain ones art.

Then there's my object "eagle" collecting. Collecting all types of US coins (and commems etc) with eagles on them. And ships, cool buildings, etc that catches my fancy.

 

I was a hoarder before I was a collector, then Varieties caught my eye. I like silver varieties.

 

I was a collector from the beginning, starting in my early twenty's. What drove it was my love of history.

 

I started as a collector and had some random silver that I didn't pay much attention to. But when silver spiked I did trade it for a 1909 S VDB. After that the race was on.