Why do you collect coins?

wrote in message
oups.com...
Well, pigeons must be fleeced, but I quit collecting because I no
longer believe in this ****ing country, nor anything it represents.
Without pride in and respect for the source, there can be no value in
relics.

Sounds to me like you'll do what makes sense to you, in spite of what anyone
else might say or think. That takes guts. But I'm curious, what country
will you be moving to?

Mr. Jaggers

On 10 May 2006 10:54:25 -0700, "The Space Boss"
wrote:


Vector wrote:

but chances of finding one in your change is slim. In the year 2020,
you won't find too many bronze Cents in your change either.

What year did they make Bronze?! I know they made Steel in 1943...

I was referring to the pre-zinc era of Lincoln Cents, in this case I
was specifically meaning Lincoln Cents from 1959-1981 because wheaties
are already fairly uncommon in circulation due to the difference in
design.

Bronze refers to a broad range of copper alloys, usually with tin as
the main additive
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bronze

Brass is the term used for alloys of copper and zinc in a solid
solution. Typically it is more than 50% copper and from 5 to 20% zinc
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brass

Charles R. Kaiser wrote:
The Space Boss wrote:
Vector wrote:

but chances of finding one in your change is slim. In the year 2020,
you won't find too many bronze Cents in your change either.

What year did they make Bronze?! I know they made Steel in 1943...


1944 - 45


So all my pennies that say 1944 or 1945 on them are bronze??!? COOL!!!

On 10 May 2006 19:43:48 -0700, "The Space Boss"
wrote:

So all my pennies that say 1944 or 1945 on them are bronze??!? COOL!!!

Actually, all of them up til 1981, with the exception of 1943 ...
afaik

On 8 May 2006 02:37:56 -0700, "The Space Boss"
stated:

I suppose the vast majority of people here are "wheeler dealers" who
make a living at trading/exchanging or selling coins either from a shop
or internet. I'm sure that in and of itself is reason enough though I'm
sure these people have a love for the hobby.

But what about those of you who collect just for the sake of
collecting? Why do you collect coins? I imagine at a basic level it's
going to boil down to some feeling you get from looking at the coins,
am I correct? Describe those feelings, the feelings why you're a coin
collector.

Thanks.

Like many collectors I began with pulling coins out of circulation.
When
I was 11 a friend found a Mercury dime in change and showed it to me.
The
odd coin did not create an immediate reaction but the seed was
planted.
The following year at my grandfathers farm he gave me some Morgan
dollars.
I would keep a few but sell a bunch of them to the sun of my German
oma's
friends. The stage was set for what would become a lifelong habit.

In my teens I didn't have a lot of money but I acquired coins here and
there. A few acquisitions stand out even after two decades have
intervened. One time I had my mom take me to a coin shop in Kingston,
N.Y. It was the typical little shop with the typical coins. I had
been
reading Coins magazine and was convinced of the value of early 1960's
proof sets. I came away with a 1961 set, for just under $10.

Reading magazines also exposed me to advertisements and I responded to
a
few. Littleton began sending me coins on approval. I kept some, a
few
dollars stuffed into an envelope along with the coins I did not wish
to
keep. The only one I can remember now was an 1804 Austrian 6 Kreuzer.
It
was big, and nice, and old! The cost was quite affordable as well.

The dark side of the coin market would strike me as well. An order
for a
XF Buffalo nickel resulted in a coin that was VF at best. A VF cost
$20,
XF $40. I still kept the coin being young and never too
confrontational
but I still hold a grudge against that merchant to this day.

Eventually I found a coin shop and started hanging out there almost
every
day. I was exposed to half dimes, bust coins, even a few foreign
pieces.
One day a man dropped off a big set of old silver thalers. A few
showed
up in Krause as unique and none of them tested as having any silver in
them. I took the to a local show for the dealer to see if someone
wanted
the batch. When the prospective purchaser asked me about the origin I
told the truth and an apporpriate offer was made for a batch of
counterfeits. I don't know if I did what I was expected to do, but so
it
went.

My early twenties were chaotic and coinless. The unresolved issues of
childhood expressed themselves, sometime quite unpleasantly, in
adulthood.
It took me to about age 24 to settle back into life. A career and
spending money would follow two years later and my interest in coins
would
quickly follow.

Almost as soon as I started buying coins, I started selling them as
well.
Modern bullion pieces in slabs bought in larger lots yielded small
profits. I took a liking to bust halves and had some success finding
AU
coins undergraded as XF. However for every undergraded coins there
were
at least ten that had problems. Scratches, cleanings, or just
overgraded
coins. This became too much work. I collected bust halves for a
while,
thought about type coins, and then eventually moved on to Civil War
Tokens.

I love maps, newspaper articles, and photographs from the Midwest in
the
1850?s and 1860?s. Civil War tokens fit right into this era. The
tokens
are less known, less written about than the main US coin series. This
has
appeal to me since it generates the idea that there are still things
to
discover. Bust halves are great in that every coin is just a little
bit
different. But, Overton, Breen and the rest have pretty much exhausted
all
there is to say about these beautiful coins. But even the tokens had
been
studied, perhaps there was something more exotic?

Eventually I landed in Sasanian coins. The Sasanian dynasty were the
last
non-Islamic rulers of Persia or Iran. The history of the Arab
conquest is
another area that fascinates me. The Sasanians had almost completely
destroyed the Byzantines (Easter Romans) only to be in turn nearly
annihilated by Heraclius. I wrote about this recently in the celator
http://www.celator.com. The Arabs under Mohammed rose right as the
conflict between the two empires culminated. But even then, the Arab
tribesmen lacked siege engines or the knowledge to use them. The
stories
of how cities like Alexandria came under Arab dominion are wonderful
reading. Sasanian coins are less studied than most and thus offer
more of
the discovery of numismatics than any US coin.

Now I have a stereo microscope, specific gravity testing equipment,
and a
small library on metrology. I?ve discovered some fakes that have
slipped
past prominent dealers. I have detailed measurements on almost 1000
Sasanian coins. I was even shanghaied to be the next president of the
Twin Cities Ancient Coin Club, one of the most active in the country.
And
yet, still I struggle with what to collect.

Am I a collector or am I something else? I do love coins, I love the
knowledge they are tied to. If I had my druthers I would study,
measure,
and write about coins and history for a living.

With this site I've combined by day job of database
administrator and my hobby to create standardized databases of coin
prices. I started with US because the programs and processes are
easier
but I hope to do as many coin types as I can. But what should I
collect?

One thing that appeals to me is combining geneology and coins. One
coin
per ancestor, with an understanding that some speculation is necessary
as
I go back to ancient times. Another idea is the coin per century set.
That?s a nice one and one that can be upgraded or expanded. The
problem
is that such a set is not tied to anything, it has no internal
cohesion. I
think what I need is the framework of a story, a story that can then
accentuate with coins. Maybe I just need to tell one story at a time.

Jorg Lueke wrote:

N.Y. It was the typical little shop with the typical coins. I had
been
reading Coins magazine and was convinced of the value of early 1960's
proof sets. I came away with a 1961 set, for just under $10.

What year was all of this happening, ie: the mercury dime your friend
showed you, buying the 1961 set, etc...??? Great story though.


My early twenties were chaotic and coinless. The unresolved issues of
childhood expressed themselves, sometime quite unpleasantly, in
adulthood.

I don't understand what this means? Please clarify.

On 11 May 2006 13:14:22 -0700, "The Space Boss"
stated:


Jorg Lueke wrote:

N.Y. It was the typical little shop with the typical coins. I had
been
reading Coins magazine and was convinced of the value of early 1960's
proof sets. I came away with a 1961 set, for just under $10.

What year was all of this happening, ie: the mercury dime your friend
showed you, buying the 1961 set, etc...??? Great story though.

This would be the mid 1980's.



My early twenties were chaotic and coinless. The unresolved issues of
childhood expressed themselves, sometime quite unpleasantly, in
adulthood.

I don't understand what this means? Please clarify.

I had more importamnt things to resolve than collecting coins and no
dinero.