My first Roman Republican coin

Speaking of grandparent gifts:

(No, I wasn't lucky enough to get an ancient, but, hey, I still got steered in the right direction.)

(Reposted cointent follows below.)



This is the coin that launched my numismatic adventure.

On Thanksgiving Day, November 25, 1976, when I was not quite 11 years old, we were at my grandmother's house and I was asked to set the table for the upcoming feast.

Grandmomma pointed out where the silverware drawer was in a huge old sideboard in the dining room of her grand old Atlanta house. In that drawer, I found a 1936 Mercury dime! It seemed incredibly ancient to me at the time... forty years old. Now forty years have elapsed since I found it. I also found a 1948 Franklin half that had been shot with a bullet, and a 1943 steel cent. (Grandmomma let me keep the steelie but not the Frankie- that was a souvenir of some uncle's marksmanship and had apparently been shot in the air, Annie Oakley style.)

The 1936 Merc dime won't win any "best coin" competitions, but being the sentimental creature that I am, I kept the coin, and it survived the vicissitudes of the building, destruction, and rebuilding of so many of my collections over the years.