Memories from my early days of collecting...

[jtryka]

I thought this might be an interesting topic, especially for the more senior members to share with us newer collectors.

 

As for circulation, there were very few finds at least in my early days of collecting, but keep in mind that was around the time of silver and gold's big run up, so there was virtually no silver left in circulation. Later, as prices collapsed, some made it out, and actually, the most silver I have found was in the last 10 years, as I have found numerous Franklins and silver Kennedys in circulation. Still, rarely I would find silver in change (like once every couple of years). I did often find wheat cents, and old Jefferson nickels in change, lots of war nickels despite the silver content. I also used to find silver certificates fairly regularly, and the old Monticello back $2 bills (I still think those are my favorite design of all time). Also a lot of red seal $5 US notes. Used to get a lot of old FRNs too, especially series 1928 small notes, which were interesting just for their legends stating the "were redeemable in lawful money" at the Treasury or FRBs. I also remember getting a lot of Ikes, they were always fun since they seemed enormous to a 9-year-old, my dad used to bring them home from the bank for me on payday. I also remember in 1979 when they introduced the SBA, interesting despite their eventual failure, it seemed to generate a lot of interest when they first came out.

 

As far as collecting, it seemed like mail order coins were much more popular than today, though I suppose a lot of that has been replaced by eBay. Coin shops were kinda interesting places since the ones I went to always sold other stuff, mostly war memorabilia, so it was half buying, half museum visit. One of the most interesting things was the prevalence of collecting among the general public. It seemed like most of the downtown department stores had coin and stamp departments. I lived south of Chicago, and there was a nice department at the Marshall Fields store on State Street, I think it was on the 8th floor, or one of the higher less trafficked areas. I believe Carson Pirie Scott also had a department in their downtown store. I haven't been back to those stores in quite a few years, so I doubt they still even have those departments.

 

So what do you remember from your early days of collecting? Whether you started in the 1940s or just this year, it would be interesting to share.

[shirohniichan]

I didn't start collecting until the 1970's. I found silver coins, dateless Buffalos, and wheat cents in change fairly regularly.

 

The coin shop near my house was a smokey place inhabited by one friendly dealer who stuttered a bit and one glum dealer who was fairly quiet. The place expanded in the boom years around 1979-80, but after the precious metals/coin market crash I think they went out of business.

 

I tried buying coins through the mail, but met with little success (also known as Littleton success). I might as well have thrown my money into the street.

[nwcs]

Well, I had an off-on start to coin collecting. My older brother collected, as well as my grandfather and mother. Although mom didn't get that much, but when my grandfather died she got a number of his coins. I remember looking at them but not understanding (he died in 1980 when I was 7).

 

In 1982, we had the world's fair here in Knoxville and I got a hungarian mint set because I thought the coins were neat. I didn't understand why they weren't worth the numbers on the coins... I basically stopped till 1988 when I was 15 and went to a few local coin shows. My family was poor and I didn't have much money for coins. Had a paper route and worked at a convenient store and spent about $15-$20 a month on coins. Back then it would seem that people didn't care about encouraging YNs because all the dealers seemed like they wanted to rip me off. I got most of my foreign coins then because I felt like I knew as much as they did (probably not far from the truth -- we both knew nothing!)

 

After I turned 16, I started working at Walmart and had a little more money and did more mail order coins. I was happy with them, but as I found out last year (as I finally learned some things) I got ripped by the dealer we used who sold us harshly cleaned and corroded junk. After a while I dropped out of the hobby and didn't come back really till last year. I got a bit interested when the state quarters came out. I didn't want to miss an opportunity, so I bought the proof and mint sets. And on my 27th birthday I decided to go whole out and buy a 1924 $20 Saint (which got slabbed last year as 63) but it wasn't till I found the PCGS registry in May last year that I became more motivated to pursue coins again.

 

And for the future? We'll see. But it was fun to travel down memory lane for a few minutes...

 

Neil

[GDJMSP]

When I first started collecting - coins were still made of silver. I can remember finding the odd Liberty quarter and a silver dollar now n then - Peace & Morgan. And of course Walkers were not uncommon - Franklins were a dime a dozen.

 

My grandfather used to collect - but he collected world coins & at the time they held little interest for me. It was my grandmother who sparked my interest - she gave me a birth year dime for herself & my grandfather - 1903 & 1910. That was 43 years ago - I still have those two coins.

 

I collected religiously until my mid teens. Then as most teenage boys do - I discovered other things shall we say. And collecting went by the wayside. I did not start collecting again until my 20's - and then only halfheartedly.

 

Over the years I continued with some periods of rapid accumulation and some slow periods. Always trying to learn something - always trying to share what I have managed to learn with others. Then in my 40's - the craze struck - it's been that way ever since. But I no longer collect circulated coins as a general rule - except for pre 1800 columnarios ( pillar dollars ). I collect only Mint State coins now and strive to own only the best. In some cases - I cannot afford the best. So I settle for 2nd 3rd or 4th best - for now.

 

The registry craze holds little interest for me - I understand it - I just don't participate. It is enough for me to know what it is I have. And if I choose to share with a friend - then I do.

 

I am now teaching my young son ( from a late marriage ) to collect and what I know of coins. He has the bug - but we'll see what happens in a few years when he discovers other things

[jtryka]

These are some great posts! One of the things Neil mentioned that struck a chord with me was growing up poor. Well, I wasn't exactly growing up in a shack in Appalachia, but the 1970s in the rust belt were hard times, much harder than we have seen since. I am not sure even in the current downturn if many of the folks under 30 really understand what it was like living through really difficult economic times. Yes I know there is not comparison to the great depression, but it's surely a distant second in the last century. Unemployment was high, I remember my father being out of work several times, and my mother being forced to go to work outside the home to make ends meet. I remember often not having any money to spend on frivolous things like coins, as we could barely make the mortgage payment and buy groceries. And to top it off, interest rates were high and metals prices were going through the roof! It was bad enough having little to spend, but imagine having to pay $5 for a common date circulated silver Roosevelt! Well, gradually times got better, and I got older, and started mowing lawns and painting fences, and other odd jobs to earn some pocket money. By the time I was in 7th grade, I made a big jump into gold! Prices were still pretty high, I think over $400 an ounce for gold, and my friend at a dealer in town offerred to help me buy my first gold eagle (not the bullion kind, they didn't exist yet!). It was a common date, I think it was 1882, and the price was $240 in XF. She was nice enough to let me pay over time, a little bit every time I would have some extra money. Sometimes $5, sometimes $10, but eventually over a couple years, I paid it off. She used to mark the envelope they kept it in with each payment. Later I did the same thing with a BU set of Roosevelt dimes. Anyhow, times were tough then, but at least there were still a few people in the business that appreciated young collectors and went out of their way to help them out. I don't do business with that company anymore (since I moved 2000 miles away and they have moved more into Jewelry than coins), but whenever I go home to see my folks, I still stop by to say hello to my friend, her name is Jan Marchese at James & Sons Ltd.

 

 

[darktone]

I remember as a kid in the early 70's that the Woolworth store had a coin and stamp department and they actually had a pretty good selection of different series but the store closed up in the late 70's. Also the local Ben Franklin five and dime store had blue Whitman books and little bags of coins you could buy. mike

[John Maben]

Yes, Woolworth which later became Woolco, in the Philadelphia area anyway. Also in Philly, a department store called Gimbels which I think was later bought by Macy's had a decent coin and stamp department.......back then it seemed most coin stores also bought and sold stamps, but that is certainly not the case today as very few do.

[toyonakataro]

I don't remember when I started collecting coins, but I do remember when I bought my first U.S coin back in 1980.

Is was a raw buffalo nickel and now it's in PCGS holder

It wan't easy to get nice U.S coins especially at proper price in my country, so I stopped collecting for a while.

Late in 1999, I happened to find eBay while surfing internet and restarted collecting U.S coins.

I could have bought Mercedes if not for the internet

[DWLange]

My first coin purchase was at the Woolworth store in downtown San Francisco. I bought a 1914 Lincoln in Good for 75c. Thirty-five years later, and it still isn't worth that much! Nonetheless, I was delighted with my acquisition. For the same price I could have bought a common Seated Liberty Dime in Good or so, and that would have been a better value.

 

I remember that the going rate for Barber Halves was $1.75, Morgan Dollars $3 to $3.50.

 

These coin departments were done as a franchise. The operator leased a space in the store, while operating independently of it. The coins and stamps were supplied by wholesalers, such as the Friedberg Brothers, and the guys running these departments often knew very little about numismatics and philately.

 

Knowing what I do now, I wouldn't bother with such businesses at all, but, to a child it was coin heaven.

[John Maben]

Ah yes....... but DL........ I remember in the late 70's toward the tail end of this phenomenon, you could actually buy at under market at these establishments as the silver price often exceeded the retail prices certain coins were marked at!

[Hoot]

the silver price often exceeded the retail prices certain coins were marked at!

 

John - What dealer in their right mind would have done THAT? They might have sold the coin then had it sold back to them for silver! Seems nuts.

 

In the late 1960s and early 70s I would ride my bicycle 10 miles round trip for a visit to the coin shop. I look back on those purchases and realize that I, like DL, made some rather poor investments! But it was thrilling, no less, and I still have a few of those coins. Indeed, I still hve the 1922 peace dollar (around AU50) that I bought in 1972 for $1.50! I thought I had bought a little slice of heaven.

 

Hoot

[Oldtrader3]

I first started collecting minor's after finding an 1804 Half Cent (in 1956) while hoeing my vegetable garden in the back yard. I lived in Falmouth, Massachusetts at the time. Back then, I collected mostly EF-AU Buffalo's and Mercury dimes from circulation.

 

Gold was still $35/ounce and BU Saints were $42/$45 apiece at the time I started buying them in the mid-1960's. I could not afford to buy very many, but I accumulated a full BU roll of Saints. Plus, a Capital holder Type set of Liberty and Indian gold, including an 1855-S $3.00 gold slider! Boy, do I wish I had held onto that one!

 

By then we started having a family, and I stopped collecting for about 10 years. I started again when I sold a roll of Morgan's (that I won in Las Vegas) for $48/ounce. Right at the pricing top! Just before slabs appeared, I built full BU Peace, "O" date and "P" dated complete BU Morgan Mint Sets in Capital holders. I sold those a few years later to help with a house down payment.

 

After the silver sets were sold, I went back to collecting various type coins. In the past few years, I have been collecting Type (mostly BU) Gold coins, plus another Peace dollar set.

[John Maben]

"John - What dealer in their right mind would have done THAT? They might have sold the coin then had it sold back to them for silver! Seems nuts."

 

.....As the price of precious metals moved up many of the bullion related pieces were priced below melt. As for buying them at higher prices, these places usually offered WELL behind the market so that wouldn't happen. For example if the local coin shop was paying 4X face for 40%, they were at 2X.......

[gmarguli]

My grandmother used to buy proof and mint sets every year and I would look thru them. I knew nothing about coins, but the proofs looked nice. Around 12 years old I decided I wanted to buy a few coins.

 

The coin shops were usually run by jerks. I found one shop that had a bid board. It was a family run shop and one of the owners was nice. He'd take time to show me nice coins (ones that I could never afford) and he'd teach me things. Looking back, most of the things he taught me were pretty basic, but back then it was great for him to take the time with me.

 

I scoured the phonebooks looking for new coin shops. So many dealers were scum. They didn't want to deal with you unless you could buy expensive coins.

 

I remember my first major show, Long Beach. It was massive, overwhelming, and somewhat intimidating. PCGS had just started up. I remember 99.9% of the coins in the cases were raw. I remember a dealer smashing a slab against the floor and swearing because he couldn’t get the coin out.

 

I wasn’t exactly rich, but not poor either. I figured the only way to beat the dealers was to cherrypick varieties and learn to grade better than them. Those were the good old days, back when you could buy raw Morgans that they’d call MS64 and you could have them slabbed as MS66 and make a few hundred percent profit. Of course, I got screwed on some coin purchases as we all do. Moderns were getting hot and NGC became snobbish and wouldn’t grade them. I’d send in a few to PCGS to try and figure out what they were looking for. I made more than my fair share of PR66 common date modern proofs. I finally figured out what it took to get a PR69 (before they changed the standards a few dozen times). I’d sell them on TeleTrash for insane money or trade them to a dealer in Long Beach for gem Morgans and other classic coins. I miss those days. Where else could you make those type of profit margins.

 

As time went on I started collecting errors and varieties. I did some mail order sales. Bought and sold on the local bid boards. Finally started making some good money at it.

 

A few things really stick out in my mind. I remember trying to place a bid in a Superior auction. I wanted to bid $5000 on a gold commemorative. I was rudely told the coin would sell for much more than that and I was wasting his time. That was the end of him speaking to me. The coin went on to sell for $5000. Since then I have never done business with Superior. They have been sold a few times since them, but I still can’t get the bad taste out of my mouth.

 

Another was when I was at the Long Beach show and I was looking at a proof Morgan in the Heritage case. I was asked if I wanted to see it. I told the guy there was no way I could afford it. He said that it was alright and asked again if I’d like to see it. The guy turned out to one of the big guys there. Knowing full well that he wasn’t going to get a sale, he was still willing to show a kid the coin. Now I could buy a box of proof Morgans and I continue to do business with Heritage. Superior never got 1¢ of my money.

 

Both these incidents happened well over 10+ years ago, but I still remember them. One company lost a customer for life. The other gained a customer.

 

As with everyone else, I slowed/dropped out of collecting for a few years. Other interests, college, & work took up my time. A few years ago I decided to sell all my coins and invest the money. I sent them all off to ANACS. While selling them on eBay I got the collecting bug again, but I couldn’t decide what to collect and jumped around.

 

On day I happened upon a coin on eBay being sold by Adrian (Anaconda Rare Coins). I loved it. A colorfully toned commemorative. I was hooked and decided to put together a complete set. That was a couple of years ago and I’m still working on the set.

 

Looking back, it seems odd to remember so many high power coins selling raw. Can any of you imagine going to a shop today and seeing RAW proof Morgans and proof early gold, or bust dollars?

 

Most of the coin shops I used to frequent have closed. The internet has been killing the mom and pop coin shops.

 

[jeh46544]

Those were the good old days, back when you could buy raw Morgans that they'd call MS64 and you could have them slabbed as MS66 and make a few hundred percent profit.

 

Wish I could do that. I bought a franklin as "BU" and came back from NGC as AU58.

Only paid $8.00 so it wasn't too bad.

 

 

[davefperry]

When I was growing up I lived in the country and had to ride my bike a couple of miles to get to the store and wouldn't have been able to find a coin shop without hopping a train. But I had a paper route and some coins I found like wheaties, silver coins and a few buffaloes caught my attention and I held onto them until my more formative years when other interests caught my eye. There wasn't much I ever found in the way of collectibles but I'll never forget the thrill of finding neat old coins that looked so special.

Maybe if there was more time another paper route would be in my future.

[jtryka]

Don't get too discouraged Joe, it's part of the learning process. I can't tell you how many times I've overpaid for coins, bought cleanes coins, coins that were supposed to be BU that weren't even close. I've learned to look more closely, and to be patient. If I see a coin that I can't live without, most of the time I just go home and think about it for a while, and then when I go back, I see things I missed the first time. But even us more experienced collectors make mistakes sometimes, I sill have a bust half I bought that I thought was a solid AU coin, turned out to have altered surfaces, and that was way more than an $8 lesson! At least I still like the coin!

[gmarguli]

Those were the good old days, back when you could buy raw Morgans that they'd call MS64 and you could have them slabbed as MS66 and make a few hundred percent profit.

 

Wish I could do that. I bought a franklin as "BU" and came back from NGC as AU58.

Only paid $8.00 so it wasn't too bad.

 

You can do that. It's just extremely hard to do it with classic coins now. You can do it with modern coins and you can do it with semi-classic proofs. Most dealers can't tell a PR66 from a PR68 to save their life.

[GP_]

great stories! Keep 'em coming! I dont have any cool stories, I didnt start collecting untl the late 90's, they werent that great of a time!

[keithdagen]

Let's see:

 

Around age 12 or 13, talking to grandpa about coins, he pulls out a set of Morgans and gold pieces and starts showing me his stuff -- then pulls out a Whitman folder for Lincolns, a bucket of wheaties, and tells me to get to work. Gives me a XF 1913 for starters, then shows me how to take baking soda and a toothbrush to shine them up (cringe).

 

That lasts about two years, then I move on, leaving Whitmans of Lincolns and Jeffersons unfinished. Fast forward to five years ago, cleaning out the closet, and my now ex-wife discovers the folders, and asks how easy it would be to finish the sets. So, we research it, and start going to coin shops in the area, and pick up enough folders to finish off the 20th Century coins in copper, nickel, and silver.

 

Within a year, I discover E-Bay and PCGS and modern commems. Imagine, $5 gold pieces for $95 a pop, and many of the deisgns are cool. I start putting together a set and buying the coins at shows and from the Mint and E-Bay. You could buy 10 or so gold commems, get them graded at PCGS, sell nine and pay the cost of the 10 plus the grading fees, basically building your collection at no cost.

 

Started buying 20th Century high-grade Type, sold that set off to pay for the divorce, then began rebuilding it. Had a 20th Century gold set, and sold that off to pay off my car. Now I'm rebuilding the Type set, except expanding it out to a Complete set, and making sure that I am more careful with what I buy.

[GP_]

keithdagen ... next time you plan on buying something big, let me know when the coin selloff is Sounds like you have had some cool sets!

[Coinosaurus]

The Marshall Field's in Chicago had a coin counter, at least until a few years ago. Dunno if it's still there or not. Anyway, Field's sent me this "15% off" coupon for anything I would put on my Field's charge. I went over to the coin counter, got the price on the gold bullion coins, then presented my coupon. The guy went ballistic, it was cool I had to walk up to the customer service department and complain in order to force him to sell me the stuff. I hope I didn't put him out of business

[jtryka]

Wow, never thought of using those coupons in the coin department! I never thought of it.

[Guest]

when I was 10 years old, I found my dads small collection of old coin in our dark, dingy basement. Roman coins, U.S. coins in the 1700-1800 range. What did I do? Gave them to my friends. I got a good whippin.

 

At age 12, spent hours and hours at a local bank, sifting thru penny rolls; and got caught many times trying to cheat the bank teller out of a penny or two.

 

At age 16, buried a gallon glass jar of rolls of Indian head pennies in my back yard, on a neighbors property. The property got sold and an office building got built near to where the coins were buried. That glass jar of Indian heads is still buried there. My old house got sold years ago; and I don't have the nerve to snoop around or ask for permission to do some digging. Oh well.

 

At age 25, my complete collection of coins got stolen. Gave up the hobby for 28 years.

 

But I have started the hobby back up two years ago; and I love it.

 

The only thing I dislike about the hobby is that with the expensive collections, I have to keep them in a bank vault. I can't show the collection off. I do keep some stuff around the house to admire; and that keeps me going. Relearning the history of coin collecting and realizing that the majority of my friends don't know a thing about the history of U.S. coins has sparked my interest and theirs also.

 

It's a wonderful hobby.