Coins in Movies - To Kill A Mockingbird (Indian-Head Pennies)

I like to find literary references to coins in novels or non-fiction books.
Here is one of the more interesting ones.

The novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, published in 1960 by
HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., became a best-seller and won several literary prizes.

The book's 50th anniversary (July 11, 2010) of publication was reported on several news outlets.

The book mentions Indian-Head pennies early on.

Scout and Jem, two children in Alabama in 1933, find a pair of such pennies and discuss them.
Scout is narrating.

Inside were two scrubbed and polished pennies, one on top of the other.
Jem examined them.
"Indian-heads," he said. "Nineteen-six and Scout, one of 'em's nineteen-hundred.
These are real old."
"Nineteen-hundred," I echoed. "Say---"

"I don't know, Scout. But these are important to somebody...."
"How's that, Jem...?"
"Well, Indian-heads --- well, they come from the Indians.
They're real strong magic, they make you have good luck.
Not like fried chicken when you're not lookin' for it,
but things like long life 'n' good health, 'n' passin' six-weeks test...
these are real valuable to somebody. I'm gonna put 'em in my trunk."


Indian-Head penny 1900


Indian-Head penny 1906

I added the film to the Coins in Movies section of my website.

The titles are narrated by an adult woman remembering her childhood in early
1930's Alabama.

A pair of hands open a cigar box displaying, among other things,
Indian Head and Lincoln pennies


A 1907 Indian Head penny and two 1960 Lincoln pennies.

The 1960 pennies and the film's setting in the 1930's is sometimes considered a "goof"
but the adult woman narrating the titles makes it clear that the events in the film
occured a long time ago in her childhood.

 

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Some time ago I started a similar thread with links to videos:

Recent TV commercials that feature coins

Enjoy :smile

 

Not a movie, but the Simpsons had a subplot of Bart learning how to collect coins with his father. Naturally, the last coin in his album to fill was the 1917 Kissing Lincoln:



Naturally the entire thing is a satire on coin collectors (may fall well into the Coin Collectors are Sad People thread). Still...very humerous.

 

Oh, and just a second thought...how can we forget about The Dark Knight. Two Face makes a decision through a doubled face 1922 Peace Dollar:

 

Man we read that book in school was one of my favorites!

 

You beat me to it!

 

the movie titanic.

rose(winslet) gives jack(DiCaprio) a 1912-S Barber dime in exchange for drawling her naked. they show the dime for a second or two.
http://www.ketzer.com/movie_props_replicas/titanic_dime.jpg
not very likely she would have a 1912-S barber dime, at that point of time and where she lived but whatever.

edit: it won't let me show the picture, so you have to click on the link.

 

I have seen stage prop coins that remotely look like Barbers.

 

Dear John is a good one, Johns father is a coin collecter.

 

In the movie Iron Jawed Angels there is a coin flipping scene at the beginning of the movie. Looks like a Barber half or quarter. I was watching it with someone though and couldn't pause it to get a better look.

 

I was watching Dragnet and Joe Friday's partner Gannon wanted a cup of coffee, so Joe tossed him a 1964 quarter.