I been buying and collecting coins since the 1960's. I took a break mid 1990's till about five years ago when my son was grown. I readily admit the coins I was purchasing back then were junk. Thing is I was up on the hobby but I don't remember all the fuss back then about cleaned/damaged coins. In fact I remember talking with a seasoned guy many years ago that told me mid 19th century silver was expected and accepted to be generally cleaned. So I know our views of cleaned coins has evolved over the years, and yes I believe they have changed for the better. Conservation for future generations should be applauded. I said I have a question and it is this.... Were cleaned & dipped coins shunned prior to the advent of the TPG's? I see some nice pieces displayed here regularly that are or have been cleaned that to my eyes are still attractive coins, yet we avoid them like a person with the flu. Is the current negative view of coin cleaning relatively recent?
Not to me Randy. In my area and the dealers I have dealt with in the past any cleaning has been a negative. I light cleaning was market acceptable but frowned upon. Personally, I prefer non cleaned, natural coins.
First thing you definitely have to separate cleaned and dipped coins. I think if you change your post to "were improperly cleaned coins shunned prior to the advent of TPGs" it may reflect more what you're asking? Then after that I can't comment cause I'm too young but I have a hunch about the answer. I'll let the old timers weigh in.
In 1922, a famed American and British numismatist accidentaly killed himself cleaning coins before a show , so I would say into 1800s. don't Drink and Clean !! Some gold/silver miners use cyanide to concentrate gold dust even today. Wacko. https://www.numismaticnews.net/flipside/drinking-and-coin-cleaning-a-deadly-mix
Hey @GrannyMel66.... Any coin that is cleaned harshly. And harshly would encompass most anything other than allowing the coin to reside in distilled water. What happens when a coin is cleaned, the mint luster is removed. And once the luster is gone it is always gone. So collectors generations from us will not be able to enjoy the coin as it should be...... So this isn't a bad thing. I am just wondering if the evolution of our current view of cleaned coins is recent because I do not remember it being such an important topic when I was collecting last century.
There is a difference between dipped and cleaned. Dipped refers to dipping most often a silver coin in a weak acid solution to remove tarnish. After that is done the coin must be thoroughly rinsed to remove all of the dip solution. If that is not done, the toning will return, sometimes much worse than before. Dipping can be overdone. If the coin is dipped for too long, or if it is dipped repeatedly, the surfaces will become dull and lifeless. Such coins can become “no grade pieces” if it is bad enough. Cleaning refers to moving medal on the surfaces of a coin. Tell-tale signs are little scratches like hairlines or bright, polished surfaces. There is a difference between polished surfaces and original mint luster. Mint luster plays with the reflection when you swirl a coin under a light. Polished is usually just a shine. It’s hard to explain the difference in words, but once you have shown the difference, it will probably stick with you. Learning to spot mint luster is cornerstone to learning how to grade coins and spot problem pieces. In today’s market a lot of collectors want coins with original surfaces that have not been dipped. They won’t touch the dipped pieces, although I think that they are getting a bit extreme. Most any coin from the 19th century has had something done to it. Much of what these fussy collectors insist upon is secondary toning that has formed after a coin was dipped years ago. I know you might be confused by now, but I’ve tried to give you the beginnings of an answer
Thank you for trying to explain that, I remember sometime past finding a clump of coins buried in some nastiness and taking Lysol to them, thinking to myself 'these are getting cleaned before I touch them' lol. Used to work as a painter so I was always finding stuff.
Here are two examples. This 1876 Twenty Cent Piece is 100% orignal. It has never been dipped or cleaned. PCGS graded it MS-65. This 1875-S Twenty Cent Piece has been dipped. I have owned this coin for 23 years, and its color has not changed. Therefore it is stable. PCGS graded this one MS-63, which on the conservative side IMO. It would be a very fast seller at the right price. Some collector might shun the 1876 because they would think that it is too dark. It too is stable. I've owned it for 5 years.
John I agree it has original like surfaces, but how can one say it is 100% original, never dipped unless a pedigree accompanies the coin from the mint to now? Dipping with very low concentrations of chemicals can have an effect that is difficult to differentiate from original after a few years. I have no problem with the grading, but 100% implies an absolute certainty,which I would be unsure over a century plus. Jim
By some yes, by others no. For example, it was in 1960 that I first started collecting coins. And once I did my grandfather sat me down and explained something to me while looking at coins in his collection. What he did was to show me examples of coins that had been harshly/improperly cleaned and examples of coins that had not. And he asked me if I could see the difference. On some I could easily see the difference, on others I could not see it at all. But he explained what to look for and how to recognize it. But the primary point that he was trying to get across to me was this, for most collectors harshly cleaning your coins was not only OK but expected. They believed that's what you were supposed to do with your coins. Every once in a while you were to get them out and wipe them down with a rag or cloth. And this had been the acceptable practice for hundreds of years. And it wasn't just collectors, even museums did this, it was even done at the Smithsonian with the official US Collection. However, he was in a different group. He was of the belief that doing that harmed the coins, and he showed how and why it harmed the coins. I was only 7 years old at the time but even then I could easily see what he was saying, and I agreed with it. Collectors who thought like he did were the definite minority, but there were others like him. And over time their numbers grew. I cannot tell you exactly when it changed, but my guess would be that it was in the 1970s that things changed and the minority became the majority. And since then it has continued that way with the numbers of collectors against harsh cleaning growing and the numbers in favor of it shrinking. But even today there are still those who think nothing of it and they still practice harsh cleaning. Sometimes it's due to ignorance, sometimes it's due to they just don't like the way the coin looks so they do whatever they can to try and make it "look" better. Better in their eyes anyway, and they don't much care how they get it that way. So by the time the TPGs arrived, and their beginnings were in the 1970s, harsh cleaning was largely frowned on. By '86 and '87 when PCGS and NGC came along harsh cleaning was pretty much looked upon as being a sin if you will. But even then there were still those who disagreed. And as I said some of them still exist. It is said that the practice of harsh cleaning began in Europe before the US even existed. Back then it was largely royalty and nobility that collected coins. And they had someone whose job it was to take care of their collections, and that included getting the coins out every now and then and wiping them down with cloths and rags. It was simply what was done, what was supposed to be done. And that's largely why it's so hard to find examples of old European coins that have not been harshly cleaned. But since you can find them, rather obviously not everybody did their jobs. And it was while I was helping to write "Gold Ducats Of The Netherlands" that I found additional information that I had read about long before - that dipping coins was also in practice at least a couple hundred years ago. I can't say it was really common, but it did happen. At some point some industrious caretaker had discovered that using chemicals and or cleaning agents of one kind or another worked, and worked quite well when caring for the coins of their master. And it was easier. So as I see it, that perhaps explains why some old European coins can be found that do not have traces of harsh cleaning. Bottom line, the practice of cleaning coins, both harshly and properly, is very, very old. And as with most things over time we have learned better and better ways of doing it, and doing it without harming the coins. But even today there are still only a few methods by which this can be done. And even today there are still those who do not practice those methods.
When I starting collecting in the 1960s and started buying coins from dealers circa 1964, "white silver" was pretty much the norm. People expected silver to the dipped or cleaned white. "Toned silver coins" were viewed as something that was a bit odd and totally to be trusted. The "experts" view was that toning could hide a lot (which it can) and that collectors were better off if they purchased the white coins were they could see all of the surfaces easily without the interference of toning. The very first "old silver coin" I purchased was a 1799 silver dollar. (Not the one I've pictured here.) It graded VF-35 and was white, although it didn't have any cleaning hairlines. When I sold it in the mid 1970s, a dealer gave me a premium price for it quite voluntarily. Today that coin would probably be a bear to sell looking like that, but I’ll bet it’s been darkened. That’s why so many Bust Dollars have questionable surfaces and color. They had to be “fixed” to catch up with the times.
