Any awesome stories on how you got amazing coins??

I want this thread to be on people stories on how people stumbled across amazing coins and hopefully this will become a large thread. Ill start with 2 small stories on awesome finds!


1) when I first started out collecting coin about 4 years ago, my mom told me at the local thrift shop that there was a necklace with a big coin in it. she told me it was 20 dollars and that she should just buy it incase it sells fast (She doesnt no much about coins and thought this one was cool looking) when she brought it home I saw it and realized it was a Morgan dollar from 1878. I was happy with it cuz its in about MS 61 or AU58 condition and later when I looked at it I saw it was an 1878 CC minted morgan dollar! I was SO excited! I safely took it out of the bezel (Silver bezel) with out damaging the coin and got a Great coin for such a GREAT price!

2) My mom went to an estate sale with this women was basicaly boxing everything she had and selling them by the boxes for prices made up on the spot. my mom bought so much stuff with amazing political memerobilia, but when she was going through some books that where in a box, a little small envolope fell out of the book labeled March, 1877 and when she opened it she found 10 fractional currency peices all of which but one would grade ATLEAST AU58 (going to send them in later this month!) and decided to let me have them all as an early birthday present! it consisted of all first issue notes and one of the noted had an inverted back (50 cent 1st issue) and the condition was superb! after some research, I found out that there are only 3 known inverted backs of the first issue 50 cent piece and I discovered the 4th one!!! There was no better feeling! And after looking at past auction records, it should bring $2,000 plus dollars and appears to be the best condition one out of all 4 IMO (still need to get it graded to be sure)

SO after reading those I want to read your guys's stories like this! CANT WAIT! (ps: sorry for the spelling errors im typing this quick)

 

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When I was going through my grandfather's giant bucket of pennies, sorting through wheats and memorial and foreign. After we went through all of it, we checked the dates of the wheats. While looking at them, one date made be like OMG. It was a 1909 vdb penny! I was so excited! My grandfather said I could keep it, and I have it to this day!

 

When I was still in the army, I would make my rounds to all the pawn shops in about a 30 mile area. They got to know me pretty well and would call me for my opinions on certain coins and when they bought a collection I always had first chance. It was a win-win for all involved. Well, there was this one pawnshop owner who thought he knew everything there was to know about coins and currency. He was also not consistent as in one week he would try to cheat me and the next week he would be fair. He taught me more than anyone about how to walk away from a deal. Well, one day he called me and said he had a $500 note and was I interested. I said sure and we made plans to meet that afternoon. Well I didn’t really have a lot of cash at the moment but I took a couple boxes of coins to trade as we had done that in the past. When I got there and he showed me the note it was a Star note! It graded VF and I guessed the retail was around 3K-3.5K. I asked him how much he wanted and he proceeded to tell me that this was a rare note because it was a star note and said he wouldn’t take less than $900 for it. I gave him $500 cash and we traded for the remainder. I sold that note 2 weeks later to another dealer for a nice profit!

 

Here is the real story of my AVATAR..
The Story of 1995 Penny On Dime/The Gratitude.
It was drizzling in the early afternoon on a weekend on a February
1988,
before Valentine's Day. We had overcast skies. My auntie invited me to go to the shopping mall with her and two of my cousin. She drove the car while I sat in front and my cousins sat at the back.
While we were inside the mall, my auntie told me to go back to the car because she forgot her purse. I went running back to the car because it was raining outside. I did not have umbrella with me. A four to five year old child running towards me from their car when a black speeding car suddenly appeared on my right. Instinctively
, I grabbed the child before the car hit him. The parents were shocked with the sudden turn of events. After recovering from the shock, they thanked me for saving their beloved child. To show their gratitude for what I did, they offered me some cash, which I refused. I told them it just happened that I was there at the right time so just forget the whole incident. They asked my name, where I was heading for, and my address, which I gave to them.

　

1995,

Seven years after, a respectable gentlemen knocked at my door, I let him in on my humble condominium, he said that he brought something for me for Christmas.

He opened an attaché' case with _________________________________________________________________________________and a white looking penny. He said that he was send by the family to show gratitude for saving the life of their child. He told me to choose between the CASH or the penny, I opted for the penny.
I thanked the guy, Then, he got his cell phone and contacted his Boss. He handed the phone to me and I was able to talk to the person at the other line. He said, my son you just did a good job today. Now you own the Most Valuable Coin ( Double Denomination ) in the World.. just be careful on this one then, the man left. On the year
2000,
Mr. Alan Hager certified the penny as 1995 Penny On Dime, Mint, the inventor of certification slabbing coin experts in NUMISMATIST WORLD, Mr. Alan Hager personally graded it.
　

'' IT IS ONLY ONE OF IT'S KIND.
http://www.youtube.com/user/pennyondime95#p/f/5/_VSxPrB1t94

 

HA HA.. I actually was guessing that redwin's post would be #5 or #6. he's getting quicker!

 

How did I get amazing coins (presuming my coins are amazing, of course)? Four words: Good eye and patience.

One of my favorite stories is buying a gold dollar from eBay in an auction with terrible pictures. Ended up paying AU money for the coin. It eventually made its way into a PCGS MS 65 slab. Cha-ching. And it's a great coin too -- prooflike and quite original.

 

Most valuable coin in the world? I thought that it was agreed in at least 5 other posts that is was worth less than $1000?

 

I have others, but would share a friends:

He was a metal detectorist, and not a coin collector. He did have a Red Book, though, and knew the rare dates of common coins. One day he got a hit, and it was a few lincoln cents. He was rubbing away at the dates, and a 1909 was there, a little more rubbing and an S appeared. At this point he hurriedly flipped it over and rubbed at the bottom of the reverse. Out comes a VDB, on a nice XF coin.

Puts it in his pocket, and takes it home. Once home soaks it to take the dirt off, cleans the coin........and a hole at the top of the coin drops out. Someone back in the day had put a whole in a XF 1909 S Vdb. I saw him the next day and he was still almost crying about it.

It WAS an amazing coin, short of the hole. I would have loved to have it in my collection if it wasn't for that, (and most colelctors as well).

It was ok, he was an early collector, so got good stuff frequently. He eventually filled an album just with his detector finds, (yes the holed sVDB was there), but have a nice AU strong reverse 22 plain, and a XF 14d, so still a nice set for free. Unfortunately, he got conned by a dealer when he sold silver in 1979, and the dealer talked him into selling the entire set and about 5000 extra wheats he had to him for $300.

 

http://www.coinfacts.com/error_coins/double_denomination_errors.htm

DOUBLE DENOMINATION ERRORS
One of the most expensive, popular, and desired types of errors are the double denominations. This error happens when a coin is struck on a previously struck coin of another denomination. Examples are a cent on a struck dime, and a nickel on a struck cent. The most dramatic are those with considerable design visible from the original strike.

This coin 1995 is so special Two Full dates 1995 Key date, Two LIBERTY, Two IN GOD WE TRUST, VDB , P Mintmark plus skull break and a crack die variety, A plus 5 stars was certified personally by the Inventor and professional expert in Numismatist World.-Actually I did ask Mr. Alan Hager why he did not put the coin a number Like MS 67 or 68 or something. Well, your coin is UNIQUE It does need too. Then he handed it to me with a B/Card of him. Happened on Baltimore Coin Show in Maryland, March of 2000. Large Crowd....

 

HE HE HE ..Mental Telephaty.. It just happened I was on line..

Have FUN NJOY READING all the stories here..:thumb:

 

AWWW no more stories? I thought this would be a more popular thread

 

Okay, my first coin, I was like 11 years old at a longbase game in 5th grade I think it was (longbase is kind of a dead game, but my school tried to revive it, it's like kickball but with two bases). I was derping around before the game and saw something shiny in the dirt so I picked it up and put it in my pocket. It was a Franklin half! I didn't know what it was until years later. Unfortunately I was stupid when I was a kid, and cleaned it with toothpaste to make it shiny again >.<. So it's worthless as a collector's piece. But it's still worth spot.

 

I was at a local coin auction a few years ago and one of the lots was a 2007 Jefferson Presidential Dollar graded PCGS MS67 w/ Missing Edge Lettering. I was instantly excited about the lot since I knew the Washington and Adams MEL coins were pretty popular at the time and the Jefferson examples were very hard to come by... especially in an MS67 grade. I looked up the PCGS Price Guide on the coin and at the time it was $5000!! I was definitely prepared to spend at least $2500 to get it.

When bidding opened up, the auctioneer's assistant read off the high mail bid on the coin of $70. I quickly raised by bid card and bid $75 (+10% buyer's premium) and to my shock no one else in the room was interested!!!!! I ended up selling the coin online to another collector for a little over $2000 less than 48 hours later

==============

Another story wasn't quite as profitable, but got me a few really neat coins. At one of the Long Beach shows a couple years ago, I noticed a dealer had lots of newly slabbed PCGS 1909 VDB Lincoln Cents in grades of MS63RB and up. I asked to see several of them and was interested in buying a few. I asked about why they had so many and it turned out the dealer had a few original rolls of them in his vault for 25+ years and finally decided to get them certified. I was told the rolls originally cost the dealer less than $500 each back when they were acquired. Appreciating my interest in the 1909 VDB cents, the dealer pulled out a few additional boxes of freshly graded 1909 VDB cents that were behind his table and then showed me some of the best coins of the bunch that he submitted. There were several high grade coins including a few MS67RD examples, but the two that caught my eye the most were two examples graded MS67RB! I had been watching the population reports of the 1909 VDB and a few months before this show I noticed the population of the 67RB went from 1/0 up to 3/0. Me and a few other collectors thought that had to be a mistake, but seeing the freshly graded two 67RBs at the show proved us wrong! I quickly grabbed them up along with the best toned MS66RB 1909 VDB I have ever seen and I strong believe I got them all at bargain prices. Just really cool to also know that the three coins came from the same group of original rolls. Wish I could find some original 1909 VDB rolls today!!! PCGS recently imaged each of these three coins for PCGS CoinFacts:

PCGS MS67RB


PCGS MS67RB


PCGS MS66RB

 

Redwin, that story you made up is the biggest load of Bologna I have ever heard! Even if it is true you have an $800 coin if it were certified by PCGS or NGC. Since it is not, worth at most $600. Have a nice day.

 

This is probably the most random find.....

In 2006, I was doing a routine patrol with my unit in Afghanistan, I found 3 50 Fil silver coins in the dirt. Worth $60 bucks a piece or so.

 

Nice story & thanks for sharing it. When I was 14 years old I took charge at a very bad bicycle accident & saved a teen's life. His dad gave me a nice uncirculated 1878CC dollar in appreciation and it is in my collection today. It toned nicely in my 7070 album for about 30 years before I had it graded.

Here is a CT thread that describes some double denominations like your avatar:
http://www.cointalk.com/t74328/

 

I took a lot of Iraq coins (a 25 fil & a 100 fil) at auction this week, both AU+ & both 1959. Never heard of them, but for $5.50 + %15 buyers premium I couldn't resist. Was the $60 intrinsic, or numismatic value?

 

Forgive my ignorance.

They were very similar to this one. All from the 1930's

http://www.ebay.com/itm/LARGE-RARE-...310?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item5643cc9496

 

Here is a more complete description of what happened when I was 14.

The teen had crashed his bike at Lake Tahoe and was bleeding from the back of his head. Someone had called an ambulance. The ambulance personnel (first ambulance) were fumbling around looking for a bandage to put on the wound. The driver & the helper were going back & forth to the ambulance because neither of them could seem to locate the bandage for which they were looking. IMO, this ambulance team was only qualified to transport people without life threatening injuries. I really believe that the driver & helper were retired husband & wife that bought an ambulance like someone might purchase a cab or a tow truck to start a business. I was amazed that none of the adults were taking charge of the situation. They were all just standing around watching the teen bleed to death. This kid was loosing a lot of blood while I was keeping him talking & learning his name and phone number.

I found a phone, dialed O and got transferred to the local hospital & asked for another ambulance to be dispatched. I remember leaving the phone covered in blood & wondering if I was going to get in trouble for requesting another ambulance. The blood was really flowing from the kid and fortunately the second ambulance arrived very quickly. I remember hearing its siren shortly after hanging-up the phone. The second ambulance team didn’t waste any time looking for the proper bandage. They had the teen loaded in the ambulance & were gone in a minute. I was covered in blood & put the teen’s bicycle in a safe place before getting a ride to the hospital. I gave the ER doctor the teen’s name & contact information & they gave me a clean shirt. The teen had a broken skull & was transported to Reno for surgery to remove the bone fragments in his brain. His dad learned that I was a coin collector. He bought the CC dollar in Reno & gave it to me. It is not for sale and it is worth much more to me than the TPG grade would indicate.

That was a lot of typing but it’s my story of how I got my 1878CC.

 

Thats a really good story! Was the kid okay in the end?