| Author |
 Replies: 34 / Views: 3,302 |
Page 3 of 3
|
|
|
|
Valued Member
 United States
161 Posts |
Oops!
Did I use the wrong word?
I thought contemporary meant "happening, existing, living, or coming into being during the same period of time" i.e.
"Abraham Lincoln was contemporary with Charles Darwin."
My apologies if wrong.
If you go to 1916, you take 1916 money. If you go to 1893, you take 1893 money.
What's the word I'm looking for?
Steve
Edited by Firecom911
01/25/2008 9:10 pm
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
535 Posts |
I'd spend my $100 in the present. Buy price guides for coins, tokens, paper money, as well as sports cards, stamps, antiques, etc. I'd go back to 1920 to meet my grandpa as a young man. I'd give him the books and spend some time with him. I'd let hims spend the next 80 years investing in his coin collection or whatever he wanted to. Hopefully by the time he passed away he would leave me an excellent collection that he would have enjoyed building.
|
|
Moderator
 Australia
16842 Posts |
quote:
Did I use the wrong word?
No, "contemporary" is usable, but it's a comparative word - it means "the same time period as...". I simply assumed you meant "the same time period as yourself", since you are the one doing the travelling. Phrasing it "$100 in money contemporary with your destination" would be less ambiguous. quote:
What's the word I'm looking for?
I would suggest "period", as in "period costume". Taking period money would reduce your profit margins, of course. It would cost a lot more than $100 buy $100 worth of old US banknotes and coins. As I said before: take $100 worth of silver or gold bullion back with you instead - it would be much cheaper to buy here. Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
|
|
Pillar of the Community
Canada
1106 Posts |
quote:
After all, if some guy turned up on the average American's doorstep today with "$100 worth" of ceramic coins and plastic banknotes of strange design, dated 2097, and featuring President Zefram Cochrane or Field Marshal Joachim McMurdish, I imagine they'd be pretty reluctant to give him full face value in greenbacks or $100 worth of Utah quarters in exchange.
Well Duh! Everyone knows that Zephram Cochrane wasn't a president but the first to break the Warp barrier, before being lost in space in 2117. 
Was this a geek test?Edited by chrycopaul
01/25/2008 11:51 pm
|
|
Valued Member
United States
161 Posts |
Sap, Agreed...taking period money would indeed reduce your profit margin. Silver bullion would work okay, if it would be accepted without assaying for purity. If you're going to the late nineteenth or early twentieth century, what about taking $100 in common date Morgans dated before the year you're going to? Instantly recognizable and spendable!  Edited by Firecom911
01/25/2008 11:53 pm
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
5318 Posts |
quote:
Silver bullion would work okay, if it would be accepted without assaying for purity.
Silver? I'll gladly take $100 in Aluminum ingots back to the mid 19th century--back when its value was comparable to platinum. Edited by KurtS
01/26/2008 02:09 am
|
|
Valued Member
United States
473 Posts |
quote:
I'd spend my $100 in the present. Buy price guides for coins, tokens, paper money, as well as sports cards, stamps, antiques, etc. I'd go back to 1920 to meet my grandpa as a young man. I'd give him the books and spend some time with him. I'd let hims spend the next 80 years investing in his coin collection or whatever he wanted to. Hopefully by the time he passed away he would leave me an excellent collection that he would have enjoyed building.
Been watching "Back to the Future 2" huh Karrlot? hah that's probably what I would do too...let him save a Buffalo here, Morgan there, a Mercury or two if he feels like it....fast foward 80 years and he certainly won't have to worry about getting that Social Security check in the mail! --Gary |
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
1130 Posts |
1797
Get a few Draped Bust Halves (only the small eagle reverse existed back then) and my half dollar type-set collection will be complete ! :)
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
1934 Posts |
1932/3: Philadelphia or Egypt.
|
|
Valued Member
United States
226 Posts |
San Francisco 1894. I would finally complete my Barber dime collection. |
|
Bedrock of the Community
United States
17884 Posts |
quote:
As I said before: take $100 worth of silver or gold bullion back with you instead - it would be much cheaper to buy here.
One slight problem with that. $100 in silver is about 7 oz. Going back during most of US history that silver will be worth between about $1.29 an oz at best and $0.30 an oz at worst. So when you arrive you will be able to convert it into between $2.10 and $9 in period money. Gold bullion is even worse. Today you could get about 1/10 oz of gold. During most of US history gold was about $20 an oz. So your gold bullion will net you $2 in period money. quote:
Silver? I'll gladly take $100 in Aluminum ingots back to the mid 19th century--back when its value was comparable to platinum.
Back when it's value was comparable to platinum? Then you want the latter quarter of the 19th century. For a very brief time aluminum was comparably valued with that of gold but its value fell down to around the level of silver by the 1860's. It didn't reach the value of platinum until sometime in the 1870's You have to remember at that time platinum had no real uses and was valued at less than a dollar an oz. It was cheaper than silver. Counterfeiters had a use for it though. They used it to make fake gold coins because its higher density made the heavy platinum fakes easier to pass than a light weight silver or base metal fake. Of course the aluminum would have the advantage that if you bought it today you could get about 30 pounds of it instead of 7 oz of silver. Then in the 1860's you could convert it into about 400 oz of silver, which would convert into about $310 of period money. |
|
Moderator
Australia
16842 Posts |
quote:
Was this a geek test?
Absolutely. I knew we had some closet Trekkers out there somewhere.  quote:
One slight problem with that. $100 in silver is about 7 oz... Gold bullion is even worse. Today you could get about 1/10 oz of gold...
Again, we have confusion about then-money and now-money. This time, I was thinking more along the lines of "enough bullion to convert into $100 worth of period money". Say, enough raw gold to make 5 double-eagles out of. Pricey, sure, but not as pricey as period coins and notes. quote:
...You have to remember at that time platinum had no real uses and was valued at less than a dollar an oz. It was cheaper than silver...
Which highlights to me perhaps the most lucrative destination for a time-travelling numismatist. Russia was (and still is) one of the few sources of platinum, and the Russian Empire in the 1830's and 1840's was the only place and time that has ever seen circulating platinum coinage. It would be especially lucrative if you could convince them to take some hyperinflationary Russian banknotes from the late Empire and Revolutionary periods (which you can buy here today very cheaply) in exchange for a few 3, 6 and 12 ruble platinum coins. Especially some scarce date ones. Maybe that's why they're so scarce today; them pesky time-travellers done gone and taken them all. Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
Edited by Sap
01/26/2008 10:10 am
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
1130 Posts |
Can we bring back microchips, memory cards and processors too ? Even one found in your home computer will be worth millions just 50 years ago.
Then you can have any coin you want.
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
5318 Posts |
Conder, thanks for that detail on aluminum in the 19th C. Just going by memory here.  Regarding Russian platinum coins, a dealer friend told me about a local auction a while back where someone got a bunch of "white metal" Russian coins for dirt cheap. Later they discovered that "white metal" was platinum!  Edited by KurtS
01/26/2008 1:46 pm
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
1691 Posts |
I'd go back to 1793 and buy 10,000 chain cents..pass them down thru the generations then get reincarnated and sell and trade them for Ferraris and Lamborghinis!
|
|
Page 3 of 3
|
Replies: 34 / Views: 3,302 |
Page 3 of 3
|
First Page
Previous Page
Posted 01/25/2008 9:22 pm
