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Pillar of the Community
United States
6130 Posts |
Hi all,
So long story short, my grandfather gave me his old coin collecion several years ago. It pretty much consists of 100-200 coins collected by both my grandfather and great-grandfather (and possibly before). His father was a Finnish carpenter/painter (the coins came in a handmade "treasure chest" decorated with a message to my great-grandmother on the inside) who moved to New York in the mid-20s, and was apparently something of a collector.
My great-grandfather's portion of the collection consists mainly of Finnish and neighboring coins from about 1860-1920, with some much older coins and one 13th century German coin. I've looked up the ones of interest, and they seem to be worth about $5-20 each, with some outliers. Unfortunately, as a teenager (mid-40s), he said that he took the collection to a coin dealer and sold "all the good ones" to buy fishing lures and a new bicycle.
My grandfather's portion was mostly collected from 1952-1954 while he was serving in the navy at Korea. After the war was over, his ship took the scenic route home, and my grandfather picked up some coins on the way back as souvenirs--major stops were Japan, China, Korea, Saudi Arabia, France, and the UK. Most of these coins were WWII issues picked up at souvenir shops and contemporary pocket change.
I don't intend to ever sell these, but I was wondering if anyone knows of a good website to use as reference to check for anything that might have slipped by me when I first checked them online, and also mintages and varieties to keep an eye out for.
The most common coins are:
UK (and colonies): 1870-1954 Scandinavia: 1860-1930 Germany: 1870-1954 France: 1920-1950 Latin America: 1910-1930
Thanks!
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