Keeping and filling out an inherited IHC album. Cents from 1857 - 1861.

About 35 years ago I inherited from my paternal grandparents a partially filled IHC Whitman album. Most of the coins were in the lower to mid circulated range. While I have always enjoyed IHC's they were not a series that I collected at that point in time.

Around 10 years ago, I got much more into doing albums, and decided to complete the IHC album. In a few cases I also upgraded a slot or two. Interestingly enough, the earlier dates were all filled in, while the latter more common dates were not. The first empty slot was 1876, and the next one was 1884. After 1884, empty slots became common.

In order to keep the guts of the collection true to my grandparents collecting, I bought a ~ VG 1876 for the hole, and did not upgrade any coin until the year 1880. From that date forward the coins I bought, for the most part, tended to be high grade sliders to MS64. I'LL POST THE WHOLE ALBUM OVER TIME. For those of you who are coin snobs you might want to wait until 1880 and the latter date coins come rolling around. You'll probably have seen some of these coins, as, over time, I've posted some of them as one offs. In all cases the images are by Bob Campbell, and I think he did an excellent job.

The Whitman album had holes for Flying Eagle cents, and the FE's are my grandparents.

 

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I started an IHC set many years ago. Quit the hobby and restarted this year. I'm not sure if I'll finish the set due to cost. Last week I was bidding on one and the thing ended up going for over $160.00 with shipping. Hard to do stuff like that when retired, and have other existing sets I want to complete. All the others I'm very close realizing the coins and I have something in common in that we are both getting older. All the IHCs I have may not have diamonds, but do have the bonnet liberty very visual. The flying eagles you shared are virtually identical to mine. Good luck on your completion.