Starting To Collect Again After A 40 Year Break!

Hello everyone,

One cold, winter Sunday in 1970 when I was 7, I woke up in the morning and went down stairs to find a Whitman Lincoln Cent folder sitting in the middle of the living room. Next to it was a paper bag filled with about 200 pennies. I had never collected anything before, but looking at the album and the coins it was easy to figure out what you were supposed to do, so I took them up to my room before I had breakfast. As a matter of fact, my mother had to insist that I come down for lunch, as I wanted to continue looking through the coins. Who needed food.

Needless to say, the collecting bug bit me hard that day. I started searching my father's pocket change every day after work, asking to look at friend's coins, and lived for those infrequent trips to the coin store (which was a ways away).

The best birthday present I ever received I got at the end of 1971 when I turned 9. My dad bought me a 1881 Indian Head cent in XF. Not only was it absolutely beautiful, but in just 10 years it would be 100 years old!! I couldn't wait for that to happen. I loved it.

Six months later my father would be dead.

After that tragic event my mother, brother, sister, and I moved from upper state New York to Louisiana. The change was more dramatic that I thought it would be, but the great advantage that LA had over NY was the fact that there was a coin store within walking distance. Sure, it took over 45 minutes each way, but I could go there any time that I wanted. Every Saturday I would make the trek with my allowance money ($1) burning a whole in my pocket. The nice old guy who ran the store had a bid board that ended at noon every Sat and at that time you could buy anything without a bid for the minimum. I think the gentleman liked me because I would often find coins that I was admiring up on the board a week or two later.

Around this time I went to my first coin show where I actually held a 1909 S VDB penny in my hands. I don't remember the grade, but it was $95 and I remember my mother saying "You'll never have enough money to buy one of those." I was distraught for days over that thought.

In any case I expanded from just pennies to all denominations, but really liked Mercury dimes the best. They were made out of 90% silver (how cool was that) and decent examples could be had for much less than a dollar. In addition to many Mercurys, I managed to obtain a Confederate 50 cent bill (I remember thinking that Jefferson Davis looked a lot like Lincoln), several Seated Liberty quarters, a couple of proof sets and even a few Standing Liberty halfs.

Then, when I was 12, disaster struck. I kept my collection in a shoe box in my closet, and beneath that I would place my Whitman folders. One day I was getting ready for school when I noticed that the folders weren't under the shoe box. I picked the box up and it was much, much too light. Someone had stolen my entire collection, including the 1881 IH that my departed Dad had given me. (I still get choked up when I think about it decades later.) I ran crying to my mom, and we quickly discovered other things were missing: some of her jewelry, the silver dinnerware we used for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and a few other valuables. We had homeowners insurance, so my mom told me not to worry, but things didn't turn out well. I had a list of what I had in my collection and I got the guy at the local store to appraise the value (which he gladly did for free). However, the insurance company said that since we didn't have a rider on the coin collection, they would only pay face value. I got $10 and change. I still had about half a dozen Mercury dimes that were in a sandwich bag, but those were coins I had upgraded and had put somewhere else for reasons that escape me.

Though that was a lot of money at the time, it wouldn't come close to replacing even a small fraction of my collection. I just couldn't face starting again, so I quit collecting coins.

I did move on to other things: Records, Comic Books, Old Time Radio Shows, Hardback 1st editions, and (most recently) movies. I have over 10,000 DVDs/Blu-rays/4K UHD discs in my film archive, but I've found that I'm streaming a lot of things now and found that the urge to buy rare or obscure films on physical media has faded.

I started getting irritable and grumpy a while ago, and I finally realized it was because I wasn't collecting anything. Whenever I'm in between hobbies I'm a bit out of sorts, and when I realized that was the problem I decided I should start pursuing a new interest. I thought about movie posters, but they're too big to display more than a few, and I didn't really want a closet full of posters that I never looked at. I love the artwork on old paperback books, and I considered tracking down some of the originals, but again, wall space would be a problem and they get pretty pricey.

Recently I was digging around in the basement for something when I came across a box I hadn't opened in years and year. Inside, tucked among other mementos, was that small bag of Mercury dimes. It struck me like a bolt of lightning... I should go full circle and start to collect coins again!

So here I am! I've spent the last 2-3 weeks reading up on the hobby (a lot has changed) and trying to focus on what exactly I'd like to collect. I'd really like to have a nice collection of Double Eagles, but I'd rather not start with something so expensive since I know that I'll make some bad purchases until I can become fairly educated on the field. I'm thinking of starting with Peace and Morgan dollars, and I'm contemplating going for MS65's but I'm still thinking about that. I've gone and purchased the Red Book for 2018, and the Morgan dollar book the same company puts out. They should arrive tomorrow.

A few more details about myself: I'll be 54 years old next week, I live with my wife in central PA (State College to be exact), and my youngest is going to graduate from college in May, so I will soon have paid my last college tuition bill. Oh yeah, I also suffer from insomnia, and when I can't sleep I have a tendency to get on the Internet and type long stories.