I've never had much of a coin budget, but in recent years I've realized how this has affected my collecting habits in a positive way. When I was a kid, I collected US coins by date. If I'd been rich, I would have had the butler take me to Midas Coins so I could buy all sorts of high grade rarities. Instead, I spent countless hours going through coin rolls, where I had a ton of fun and found mint varieties (e. g. RPMs and Doubled Dies) that weren't even known to the experts. When I got interested in Medieval British coins, I couldn't afford flashy groats and Anglo-Saxon pennies, so I scoured ebay for bargains. The result was that I discovered more than 20 misidentified coins of Henry IV and Richard III, which I purchased for a tiny fraction of their retail value. I also discovered so many unpublished 15th century Irish types that I was able to write a book with twice the number of varieties than were listed in the Spink guide. That book is now the standard guide for collectors and I sold my collection for more than ten times its original cost. Ancient Greek and Roman coins overwhelmed me back in the early 1990s and at first I pretended I could afford to buy decent quality specimens. My credit card debt soared, and my collection seemed to mock me whenever I looked at it because I knew I would have to pay the piper eventually. And sure enough, it was finally swept away by financial realities. However, I recently started collecting ancients again, but this time I stayed with coins that I could afford - mostly archaic fractions. One of these is an Athenian "Seltman Group" obol. I discovered that the coin had been offered by two different dealers - who had assigned it to two different Seltman Groups. My effort to find out which one was right led me to a complete re-evaluation of the early Athenian coinages, which I am now sharing in the form of a book. Neither the Athenian book nor the Irish guide would have been written if I had been able to afford high grade, easily attributable coins. My discoveries were the direct result of the necessity to scrounge and look at specimens that better-heeled collectors might not even consider owning. Anybody else have thoughts about how their coin budget has led them into interesting places? Best, Jasper Burns
Welcome to CT. I collect Fallen Horseman mostly and budget originally helped move me in that direction .
Way cool. I was so poor and so cheap that I couldn't afford a 27c Whitman folder for my buffalo nickels and had to make a holder. Later I couldn't afford the coins I wanted so I collected clads. Now I have lots of coins at large paper profits and I can still have a ton of fun going through a few rolls of quarters from the bank. There's a lot to be said for being poor.
I have a lot of world coins due to not much money and a grandpa who has been all over, as well living in texas most collecters are not big on the world coins so I have been able to get them for cheap.
Well, Jasper, I can't say that my Spartan coin budget has led me into interesting places, but your story is definitely a pleasure to read. Welcome to CoinTalk!
That's a great story, Mr. Burns, and only serves to prove that the money one puts into coin collecting isn't as important as the enjoyment one gets out of it.
Agreed. That is a superb story with an important life lesson learned. I spent the first fifty years of my life as a poor man. I learned to love the history that spoke to me from a flat, culled V-nickel. I still see my coins that way.i could give a plug nickel for a high grade bragging piece and generally shun the upper echelon premier graded coins even though I can finally afford them if I wanted to. Yes, climbing your way up does teach a person to appreciate the beauty of common coins.
I started building a coin library at a young age. It gave me something to enjoy the many times I could not afford to be buying coins. Being broke, made me take the time to learn more about what I was doing. It worked out well and I had fun. Today with the internet, it's easy to have fun without even buying.
Probably worth pointing out that going into debt for coins (or anything hobby related) is never a good idea. Certainly not anything as interesting as your experiences, and it wasn't necessarily due to budget limitations, but I have partaken in the enjoyment of low cost coin activities. Up until around 5 years ago, I used to get boxes of pennies from the bank, sort them by year/mint, and look for known error/varieties etc. It was nice because it was essentially free entertainment, and it satiated that "treasure hunting" motivation that I think fuels a lot of people that are into collectibles. Unfortunately, everyone skimming all of the copper cents out of circulation and the majority becoming shield pennies kinda killed that for me. Oh well.
