Well, I threatened to share this Japan coin album of mine before. Here it is... I bought it with about 85% of the coins you see already in place. Most of the Keys were not there, of course, but some of the older-date coins that ARE actually hard to find were there. Just missing one coin (try finding a 1960 5 Yen coin in UNC..ugh..!). And, yes, I will eventually replace the circulated Keys with Uncirculated (Red) examples...eventually. And when I save up an obscene amount of cash. It will take a LONG time, I'm guessing. Those Monster key 5 Yen coins (1949-new version, 1957, 1958) and 10 Yen coins (1955, 1957, 1958) will be hard to find in Red/acceptable condition. Finding that corroded 1957 5 Yen coin that's presented here was hard enough... You just don't see these for sale online or at shows (that I attend). For those of you who enjoy this contemporary stuff...
So many dealer's junk boxes...so little time. Awesome collection, have fun. Do you speak/read Japanese? Have you been to Japan?
If only I could find the next ones that I'm looking for in a junk box... I'd be a happy mother hubbard! I have a rudimentary understanding of Kanji (Chinese Characters), and I've never been to Japan other than to stop over at Narita on the way to Korea.
My wife is Japanese and I have quite a few Japanese coins, but have never had a thought of trying for a year series.
Nice albums. I have a weird question: I guess the practical reason some coins are made with holes is so they can be put on a string. But is there a reason why some coins would have square holes instead of round ones?
Well, other than acquiring a half-filled album/year collection and all you have to do is fill in the keys, I would think it would be a maddening task starting from nothing to only a few coins. I wouldn't suggest it. Unless you want to end up like me... And with a Japanese spouse, YOU should know some of the language/Kanji, huh?
I'm guessing the reason is the same: To put them on a string. The square ones were cast, so I'm guessing (if you metallurgists out there would correct me) it might have been easier(?) to cast a square hole than a round one? Using modern methods, minting coins with round holes in the centers (what the Koreans call Yugong juhwa), is harder than those that don't have them. That's why the Koreans didn't make their 50 Won coin with a hole in it in 1972: Their minting technology did not allow for it at that time. So they minted it as a regular Won-hyeong (round type) coin. Square vs. round? I wonder the real reason..
Probably the initial reason for making coins with holes was either stacking them on a spindle or stringing them on a thread. Not much use in modern times. Quick trivia has the USA ever made a holed coin?
The 1852 pattern J-145 one dollar piece is a US coin with a hole. They experimented with this to make the coin larger, but retain the same weight of gold content.
I love it! We have some Japanese coins, too, but neither my wife nor I know much of the language. My mother-in-law is full Japanese and came to this country in her late-30s.
Congratulations mlov43! I've got a similar album and it's got some hideous coins that I am dying to upgrade. At the same time, I've got another album and this includes 500 yen - gets very expensive very very quickly. Will get around to them as soon as I get around. Also, a big congratulations on the red 10 yen reeded coins as well as the older 5 yen coins. I really like the old script on the 5 yen coin. Those are getting absurdly hard to find in UNC condition. If you can find them in your coin dealer junk box in UNC condition and don't really collect them, you can flip them over for a decent profit. Why let it sit there when you could be helping another collector? Also I found the silver 100 yen coins to be difficult especially 1958 and 1964 (non Olympics). I'm sure if I am willing to pay a bit more, all of them can be easily obtained. So far I managed to get by paying slightly over face value or whatever I collected from the trip in Japan. As of what I think about doing a Japanese year set - be warned that it can be a lot more expensive then you think! When you have coins that have face value of 1 dollar and 5 dollars and that they have been in circulation for more than 20 years, they just add up way too quickly.
Thanks, gx. Yes, I like the Kaisho-lettered 5 Yen coins, too. That 1952 I have there (it is in UNC, although it's toned slightly dark) was a major bit of luck. That's the key of the 5 Yen series (supposedly), and I paid less than $100 for it. I find that 1957 in anything approaching problem-free UNC to be the real "elusive spondulix" among the Japanese moderns. More hard-to-find in UNC than the 10 Yen of the same year. That one's much easier: I'll need a five-hundred dollar bill to outbid the crazies at ebay. ...but then hey, that makes me one of the crazies, doesn't it? And YES! No 500 yen coins for my year-set, thank you very much! I'll avoid that task altogether, and how convenient is it that I chose a binder that didn't even have holes for it? This binder obviously dates from the late 1970s to 1980. Upon a visit to my LCS, the proprietor shows me some "Korean 500 Won" coins that he was saving for me. They were a bag full of 500 Yen coins(!!!) I wasn't tempted. I told him what they were, and that (at the time) they were worth about $7.50 each versus the .50 cent each if they had been 500 Won coins. Other than that experience, I don't get to see any decent older Japanese coins there, or anywhere else. I'll just have to bide my time...
It's pretty interesting to see where some of the scarcer UNC 1950s Japanese coins come from. A fair number that I have seen online actually were offered by Americans, most likely from army personals that were based in Japan. The same also is applied to some of the scarcer to rarer Korean and Chinese coinage or any other world coins - some of the best were taken overseas. I guess their survival rate would be higher as they would not be subjected to meltdown, daily abuse, withdrawn from circulation etc. The key of 10 yen coin is surprisingly not any of the nice UNC reeded edge 10 yen coin but a 1986 10 yen. Yes you would have thought I have gone mad. In this particular year, Japan mint has decided to change the design of the temple. There are some minor differences however is obvious. Take a coin that is dated before 1986 and after and you should be able to see that there are some minor changes. There are some coins struck in 1986 with the old temple design and this is classified as a transitional error. Quite rare and if you have one in UNC condition, this is worth a fair amount, easily more than a few hundred.