Some Help For A Rookie Please

This oldtimer has been active in the coin hobby for over fifty years, and I still get excited about coins, tokens and the like. Bear in mind that collecting excitement can quickly turn to sorrow as one makes inevitable mistakes in judgment. Impulsive buying often precipitates errors in judgment.

You've found a great website here that should prove most helpful in your collecting pursuits. Your post suggests a few things to me. IMHO or In My Humble Opinion, you'd be wise to avoid buying too many coins on the internet until you get better educated about coins. The wise collector "buys the book before the coin."

Have you looked in your local, public library to see what coin books you might borrow? Have you run a Google search to see what coin clubs and coin shows might be in your area? Might you subscribe to Coin World or Numismatic News?

As you gather more info, educate yourself about the many aspects of coin collecting, you might try to focus on one particular coin series or collecting goal that's within your means to afford.

Not being in your geographic area, I'm unable to provide info about your area coin shops. Local collectors can help you there if you network with them through a club or this website. If you haven't done so already, be sure to subscribe to this topic so you may be notified when other collectors chime in with their thoughts and suggestions.

Regarding coin values, the books are just guides and may well not give a true market value. In another post I recently made, I pointed to a website wherein a collector might buy a 1838-D Walking Liberty half in Fine condition for $60. I've seen them selling for even less than that at coin shows. Yet, the book prices are much higher and some price guides double that cost; being based on high-end retail sales and quotes. Yet, other coins are undervalued.

It sounds like you paid a fair price for your eagle cent, being neither a great bargain nor a rip-off. However, if it turned out to be a clashed die, an overdate or some scarcer variety of the 1857 or 1858 date, you got a bargain. If it's an 1856 Flying Eagle cent, you've scored ... BIG time.

got a Red Book yet?

It will be a bit of a drive for you, but there is a shop in Simi Valley that gets good reviews from the people I know. I went in for the first time the other day and they were in the process of moving across the street, so that didn't go well. But I'm going to go back in a week or two when the new place is set up and check it out then. I can report back to you once I do if you are interested.

When I was a kid I joined the local coin club (I was in Denver at the time). I know there are a few in the LA area, but I don't go because the nearest one is an hour from me (I'm in Ventura County) and I don't feel like driving an hour each way at night for a meeting. The advantage of coin clubs is that they are usually made up of knowledgeable people that enjoy the hobby and especially enjoy helping out people new to the hobby. I can only speak from my experience as a kid long ago, but the club I went to had a monthly auction where members would bring in coins to sell. I got a great set of coins that way. Often the coins would go really cheap because when you only have a couple dozen people there is often a number of coins no one in that small group really wants.

Good luck!

There is always our website!

As noted try for coin shows. Great educational place.