Coins Are Dirty

That's it! I'm getting out of this hobby right now! Eee-yechhh!

Coins are typically made of metals like copper, silver, nickel, zinc, manganese, etc. These are all technically classified as "heavy metals" and all are toxic to most Earth life-forms, often in remarkably small quantities. Thus, coins are "self-sterilizing" and are probably amongst the biologically cleanest things you could find in your house. Washing your hands after handling coins is still recommended, not to "remove the germs", but to remove the toxic heavy metals you might otherwise ingest.

As for the rapid formation of deposits, I've heard lots of people talk about carrying around "pocket pieces" and never heard of anyone else reporting this problem. Nor have I seen it to any great extent on any normal, everyday circulation coins. I can only conclude that there's some strange chemistry going on in your pocket, perhaps involving your sweat or other moisture, and/or residual detergent or bleach from the laundry.

Best way to clean a coin is the pop it in your mouth and swoosh it around a bit. True coins are dirty, but what isn't?

I don't know about the toxicity of silver, but copper could be a problem, so I'll wash my hands before eating.

After wiping 2 hours accumulation of grime spots off of a mixture of early US, Russian and French copper this AM, I'm starting to wonder whether it's the mixture of different metal alloys and hardnesses that causes them to soil up. It's worst on the high points - central figures or rims. And it's random. Where the coins don't grime up they polish each other to bright metal.

Not meaning anything personal but how often do you wash your clothing with the pockets. Ever turn your pockets inside out when cleaning those? If you have something in your pocket that effects coins in one hour, please stay away from me.
If you place your pants on a chair and they sit there by themselves and/or get up and start walking, don't worry about your coins.

Carl, the strange thing is that this will happen in a pair of pants fresh out of the clothes dryer. I only have to walk for 20-30 minutes with coins in pocket to see it happen. Not only do the coins blacken each other, the deposits rub off and blacken the pocket linings too. I think it's a metallurgical/friction effect.

I've also worked in newsprint mills, around pressrooms, and in news recycling. The old letterpress inks were carbon black mixed with heavy non-drying petroleum oil and never really dried on the paper. This is why they rubbed off so easily. The newer inks use resin binders (mostly based on soy), but are still prone to smear. I think the worst is in magazines and news inserts, where the ink doesn't absorb very well into the clay coating

Best way to clean a coin is the pop it in your mouth and swoosh it around a bit. True coins are dirty, but what isn't?

Wow... I don't feel so good. (Particularly after reading some of the first posts on this topic...)

So the silver abraded off on my hands and pocket lining might be good for me because of a biocidal effect?

Googling around, I found a lot of references to the benefits of colloidal silver as biocide. It was used in the past for treating eyes of newborn babies, for instance. There are also a few references to the self-sterilizing properties of silverware....

Which leads to another topic which currently interests me. Coin silver was used to make early American spoons, bowls, coffee pots, etc. Because so much of it was made, it sells for about the price of bullion. A handmade teaspoon ca 1800-1810 containing more silver than a draped bust half sells for $15-30. If made before 1800 the price goes way up, and the sky's the limit if the silversmith was someone like Richardson, Syng or Revere.