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Coin Collecting Thread


NotActuallyALonghorn

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On 11/15/2020 at 8:31 AM, Armybrat said:

Heh, 65 years ago I walked to the local Five & Dime store and used my 1927 sliver dollar to buy a big bag of marbles. The clerk actually asked me if I really wanted to spend it. Eventually lost them all. 
 

Just looked in my old Peter Pan peanut butter jar to count these silver Washington quarters out for the first time. Stacks of ten.

 

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Roll of quarters in a sketchy bar can be your best friend....

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I know a tiny bit about coins, but nothing about bills. I have inherited several 20's, 50's, and 100's tucked away since 2005. Some appear uncirculated, some just very good condition (not a statement of grade, just my uneducated comment on condition). Not sequential serial numbers. Series 1996. Looks like uncle just went to the bank and asked for "new" bills.  Is there any collectable value or do I just take to the HEB, assuming it's open?

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36 minutes ago, Not that Bob said:

I know a tiny bit about coins, but nothing about bills. I have inherited several 20's, 50's, and 100's tucked away since 2005. Some appear uncirculated, some just very good condition (not a statement of grade, just my uneducated comment on condition). Not sequential serial numbers. Series 1996. Looks like uncle just went to the bank and asked for "new" bills.  Is there any collectable value or do I just take to the HEB, assuming it's open?

People on Etsy think they're valuable. So either they are, or they aren't. :D

https://www.etsy.com/listing/919781944/1996-vintage-20-dollar-bill?gpla=1&gao=1&&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopping_us_a-art_and_collectibles-collectibles-coins&utm_custom1=_k_Cj0KCQjwna2FBhDPARIsACAEc_U6QAMY_u2ML3q8-n2AFjZmNKjbDo3SapaaL67L33P4SSWzyAiwKE8aAhdCEALw_wcB_k_&utm_content=go_1844702580_70388662475_346397640928_pla-353500745642_c__919781944_129328906&utm_custom2=1844702580&gclid=Cj0KCQjwna2FBhDPARIsACAEc_U6QAMY_u2ML3q8-n2AFjZmNKjbDo3SapaaL67L33P4SSWzyAiwKE8aAhdCEALw_wcB

Edited by RDCanecutter
me not read auction.
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  • 3 weeks later...
On 5/24/2021 at 11:49 AM, Not that Bob said:

I know a tiny bit about coins, but nothing about bills. I have inherited several 20's, 50's, and 100's tucked away since 2005. Some appear uncirculated, some just very good condition (not a statement of grade, just my uneducated comment on condition). Not sequential serial numbers. Series 1996. Looks like uncle just went to the bank and asked for "new" bills.  Is there any collectable value or do I just take to the HEB, assuming it's open?

For series 1996, probably no value over face. If any of the serial numbers has a star, or is really unusual (like all 8s or something), then there is more chance, but most likely the value is what is printed on them.

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  • 7 months later...

My mom passed away a couple of weeks ago, causing my dad to go through some old files. He found some money my grandpa had put away, after the war. He had been a Seabee in the Pacific, and had some old paper money (the best is intact, the worst is torn), a mix of Yuan, Rupee and Australian (with George VI on the back side), a few French francs (Vichy?) and even a few marks. Also some coins, including some marks with nasty Nazi swastikas on one side, plus a bunch of wheat Pennie’s (nowhere near pristine), mostly copper but some the wartime steel. 
He said to sell it and put the return in my daughter’s 529. 
What’s the best way to do this? A quick eBay search makes me think none of this is worth more than a couple of bucks. Should I take it to a shop? Ebay? Something else?
here’s a pic of some of the bills. 

1277ED7B-5E8C-463A-8629-A9FCFC437C82.jpeg

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No idea. Honestly it might be cooler to keep it for whenever your daughter can appreciate it, and think about all the places her Great-Grandad went.

In the meantime, if any of it is actually valuable, it's not like it will be un-valuable later.

Maybe snag some currency sleeves or coin holders in the meantime so everybody can look at them without degrading anything valuable, if anything turns out to be sought after.

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I don't think any of that will be worth a significant amount, especially the ones in especially poor condition. But they are interesting history!

Some background on a few of them: The Japanese Government one shilling was occupation money issued by Japan for the areas they took over which had used British currency names, such as the Solomon Islands. The Japanese issued similar notes in other currencies in other places they occupied (e.g. dollars in Malaya, pesos in the Phillipines, rupees in Burma). The shilling ones are a lot scarcer than the other currencies, as they only were used in a few islands. But yours has a tear which would reduce the value.

The blue/magenta 50 francs note was issued by the Allies to be used in France after it was re-occupied by the Allies. The French did not like those much since they were much uglier than the previous French money, which was generally pretty attractive. The 1 mark was a similar issue for Germany. In Germany, both the western allies and the USSR issued similar notes. The Russians took advantage by printing a huge amount of this currency. Yours is a Western Allies issued one though.

I don't know anything about the Chinese note. It is possible it is some rare variety or something, so I would try and identify it better in case, but of course the odds are it is not rare.

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Also: Were any of them written on? It was pretty common for servicemen to save a note from each place they ended up, and get others e.g. in their unit to sign them. They would then get taped together into a long roll of notes. This was called a 'short shorter', as if you were out for drinks, and were challenged to show yours, and could not, then the drinks were on you. (Everybody else got a 'short snort' e.g. shot on your dime.) Occasionally these are signed by famous people, and those could be worth a lot. Mostly though, it is just extra history.

 

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Thanks. No, no writing. I’m leaning towards taking your info and letting my daughter take the coins and bills to school for history class. Here are some of the coins. I looked up some on eBay, and nothing seems to be worth more than a couple of bucks, at best. I was surprised the 1883 Swiss coin was worth so little- I thought that for sure it must have had some silver in it. 

4069D195-023D-492A-877C-EA78CFB5B903.jpeg

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6 minutes ago, pantone159 said:

 Maybe the India ones have some silver, they look kind of silvery, but I am not sure.

 

Yeah, the 1/4 and 1/2 Rupee are 50% silver, worth about a buck and two bucks on silver alone. Maybe get more if you find a collector.

Not that I knew any of that more than ten minutes ago, I just used this site:

https://www.ngccoin.com/price-guide/world/

It's like a visit to 1998, but it gets the job done.

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29 minutes ago, pantone159 said:

Also: Were any of them written on? It was pretty common for servicemen to save a note from each place they ended up, and get others e.g. in their unit to sign them. They would then get taped together into a long roll of notes. This was called a 'short shorter', as if you were out for drinks, and were challenged to show yours, and could not, then the drinks were on you. (Everybody else got a 'short snort' e.g. shot on your dime.) Occasionally these are signed by famous people, and those could be worth a lot. Mostly though, it is just extra history.

 

My dad had a short snorter that he started in Alaska about 1942 when the Bob Hope Hollywood troupe was there to entertain the troops. They were snowed in for an extra week, so Dad got acquainted with the “stars” during some marathon poker games in his tent. He had them autograph a dollar bill - Hope, Jerry Colona, and a number of others. My brother owns it now.

I do have several Franc notes Dad wrote on for VE Day when he was in Paris.

 

09EE0DFC-53CC-40CF-B978-369FA98D26C8.jpeg

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My dad was given this bank note when he finished his two year tour of duty as a US Army advisor to Chiang Kai Shek’s Nationalist Army in 1959. 
They gave one to each American officer with the promise that they would reimburse them with the face amount in gold whenever the Generalissimo defeated the Chicoms and took over the mainland again.

It’s been a long wait... 😅

 

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0AA4A25A-4482-4729-A690-CE9DDB62C931.jpeg

Edited by Armybrat
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1 hour ago, Armybrat said:

My dad was given this bank note when he finished his two year tour of duty as a US Army advisor to Chiang Kai Shek’s Nationalist Army in 1959. 
They gave one to each American officer with the promise that they would reimburse them with the face amount in gold whenever the Generalissimo defeated the Chicoms and took over the mainland again.

It’s been a long wait... 😅

 

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0AA4A25A-4482-4729-A690-CE9DDB62C931.jpeg

So slightly more ambitious than Confederate money, which promised a gold payout a few months after a peace treaty, even if it was just a tie.

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So, I decided to save and store great-Grandpa’s currency, plus some other coins my Dad picked up while in the service. I’m trying to sort them correctly. Here is a pic of my storage book, and also pics of two sides of a coin I can’t identify. Can anyone help? I’m trying to figure out if it’s a WWII era coin or a later one from some Asian country. Thanks. 

9025AD66-10B1-4FD7-A872-1828D9B9CEBA.jpeg

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9849B17E-FEB0-4F6C-9D53-7DA8F2F490EC.jpeg

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  • 1 year later...
  • 1 month later...

I got sucked into the youtube algorithm to watch a few coin roll hunts looking for older circulating coins, and silvers, kinda interesting to watch, but pretty normal.

 

So I guess as a result of those watches, youtube threw a UK roll hunter vid into my queue. 

It was a short vid, but mind blowing to me vs American coins and errors ( yes they happen in the US, but overall pretty damn rare, which makes finding one worth money),  That also happens with UK coins but its a whole other level

and all I can say about the Royal Mint is their quality control must be absolutely shit, combined with every coin type except the smallest ones having 3-5 commemorative versions being released every year, the Royal Mint makes all kinds of coins for circulation, but it seems like they constantly have errors.

The 2 pound notes are crazy.They are made of 2 metals with an inside and outside metal, and then the reeded edge has built in inscriptions as well.

british-2-coin-writing-around-the-edge-s

British_two_pound_coin_2015_reverse.png

 

Since there are both regular circulating and commemorative coins being made at the same time, with bad quality control,  in a single coin the following errors occur at such a regular occurrence that the coin hunter spent a LOT of time having to check that all the parts together were correct for the specific coin he was looking at.

He was looking for:

1. the wrong outside goldish (or inside silverish) stamped metal is used on the wrong inside planchet. (commemorative coin ends up with the common outside portion, vise versa)

2. the outside reeded edge is unique to a specific commemorative coin (or circulating related set).  -sayings like: standing on the shoulders of giants, what a piece of work is a man, rule Britannia, etc). The edge inscriptions get mixed up so that the commemorative coin has the common edge, vice versa, or even more uncommon, two diff edged commemorative are mixed up)

3. there are straight up spelling/date errors that arent noticed until released to circulation, then caught and you end up with 2 versions of a coin type.

4. the orientation of the inside silver planchet obverse/reverse are supposed to be locked, but every so often ( like in american coins) the orientation of the front and back are 180 degrees wrong)

and finally it turns out that counterfeiting coins is starting to be a thing in England, he found 3 obvious fake coins in his bank supplied coin rolls.

 

I can even imagine trying to coin collect where you basically have to look at every single coin, flip it back and forth constantly and review its 3 parts to see if all 3 are correct for the coin, or if one or two is wrong.  And then  having a 1% counterfeit hit rate to guarantee you lose a few pounds worth of money every time you search.  

Edited by AUS-97HORN
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In the bimetallic theme, some of the early-90s Nuevo Peso Mexican coins had sterling silver centers. I was able to dig up the info once in the past, and if fading memory is right, it was the 10, 20, and 50 pesos, and they had about 1/6, 1/4, and 1/2 of an ounce of silver each.

Not worth enough to drive across town looking for one, but worth poking around any loose change left over from an ancient Spring Break.

To put it in perspective, when the Nuevo Peso came out, it was 3 to a US Dollar, and silver was less than 5 bucks an ounce, so the silver in these coins was worth at most 1/4 the smallest coin's value, and about 1/8 maybe of the big one.

Edited by RDCanecutter
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24 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

if fading memory is right, it was the 10, 20, and 50 pesos, and they had about 1/6, 1/4, and 1/2 of an ounce of silver each.

Your memory is not so faded. I had not heard of these, so I just looked them up, and indeed there were bi-metallic coins in 1993-1995 (and also 1992 for the 10 nuevos pesos) that had the actual silver weight just as you said. My Mexico coin book can be confusing, as there were a number of bullion/commemorative issues that did have precious metals but did not circulate, it is hard to tell which is which. I wonder if I even have some of these without knowing...

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  • 1 year later...

help if you can.   I’ve found an 1881 silver dollar.   it has two I marks on the front and two I marks on the back.  having trouble finding any info.  
 

marks under the chin and pony tail

marks under the wings 

IMG_6161.jpeg

IMG_6162.jpeg

Edited by MontereyMX
Idk
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1 hour ago, MontereyMX said:

help if you can.   I’ve found an 1881 silver dollar.   it has two I marks on the front and two I marks on the back.  having trouble finding any info.  
 

marks under the chin and pony tail

marks under the wings 

IMG_6161.jpeg

IMG_6162.jpeg

First thing you wanna do is weigh it on a digital scale. 26.73 grams is what you want it to be. It may be a hair heavier or lighter due to dirt or wear, but if it's a couple grams light, probably fake.

I'll go dig up my coin book in a little bit and add more.

I don't like those marks. They give me suspicions.

Edited by RDCanecutter
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17 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

Does it have reeding on the edge? Looks like a smooth rim from the photos. Can you maybe do an edge-on photo?

 

17 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

Does it have reeding on the edge? Looks like a smooth rim from the photos. Can you maybe do an edge-on photo?

 

image.jpg

18 minutes ago, RDCanecutter said:

Does it have reeding on the edge? Looks like a smooth rim from the photos. Can you maybe do an edge-on photo?

 

image.jpg

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OK, probably good news. Not Lambo money, but better than nothing.

Bear in mind that I am a blithering amateur on Morgan Silver Dollars. I have bought and sold maybe a dozen, and seen a couple of fakes, and this could still be fake, but I just don't know it.

Weighs good

Looks OK

Not a rare date (this is good, rare dates get faked more.)

You probably have a legit 1881 Philadelphia dollar. From the amount of hair lines visible, and the worn down breast feathers, we are maybe looking at a "VF-20", kind of a C level grade. I think it would take more $ to get it graded than the coin would sell for. My book said there were 9+ million minted of this year, and VF-20 might fetch $35. I suspect that is optimistic-- I've gotten similar prices on eBay for Morgans, but your net ends up more like $25 after fees and postage. Those marks look like some bored doofus scratching at the coin with a nail or chisel, and won't improve the grading.

You may still have a nice chunk of silver. A coin dealer in town says he's paying $22 for coins like this right now, if you just want to turn it into a pizza. Avoid pawn shops.

Or maybe you want to keep it. It's got a secret that sets it apart from most silver dollars-- the worn surface shows that it was out in the world, paying bills, buying rounds of drinks, maybe convincing that dancing girl to peel off her silk stockings. 2/3 of Morgan Silver Dollars spent their whole existence unwanted, sitting in bags for a man's lifetime at the Mint. They were a scam for the silver miners, who, depending on the price of silver, could get dollar coins minted in exchange for as little as 60 cents of silver.

This one may have been in the West or Deep South, where they were more popular. Uppity Yankees preferred bank notes.

If I were you I'd take it by a coin store that has devices that can "read" the composition of the coin. They love doing stuff like that, and you'll know for sure.

PS: I wouldn't clean it or otherwise try to make it look better. People pay less when that happens.

Edited by RDCanecutter
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TIL that there can be things on coins called "cuds." Maybe you got 4 cuds.

Key Variations to Look For

As a collector, you may be interested in obtaining some of the most popular Morgan Silver Dollar errors and varieties. Here are a few notable examples:

VAM Varieties: VAM (Van Allen-Mallis) varieties are Morgan Silver Dollar die varieties identified by Leroy Van Allen and A. George Mallis. Some of the most sought-after VAM varieties include the 1878-P 7/8 Tail Feathers, the 1879-P Reverse of 1878, and the 1887-P Doubled Ear.

Clashed Dies: Clashed die errors occur when the obverse and reverse dies strike each other without a planchet in between, leaving impressions from one die on the other. A popular example is the 1889-P Morgan Silver Dollar with a clashed "E" visible on the reverse.

Off-Center Strikes: Off-center strikes occur when a planchet is not properly aligned between the dies during the striking process, resulting in an off-center design. These errors can range from slightly off-center to dramatically misaligned, and they add unique character to your collection.

Double Strikes: Double strikes occur when a coin is struck twice by the dies, creating a doubled or overlapping design. These errors are highly sought after for their distinctive appearance and rarity.

Die Breaks and Cuds: Die breaks and cuds are mint errors resulting from cracks or breaks in the die. These errors can create raised lines or blobs on the struck coins, adding a unique touch to your collection.

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