Trying To Purchase Things In Half Cents?

Half Cents were demonetized in 1857 before being made legal tender again in 1965.

By 1965, they were already considered scarce and quite valuable; the odds of someone having enough examples to attempt to purchase anything costing more than a few cents would have been quite high. Furthermore, what would they have done if the cashier completed the transaction? After 1965, the cashier couldn't, by law, refuse the Half Cents, anymore than they could refuse a $2 bill or a Buffalo nickel.

Closest modern thing I can think of is the jokers that tried to pay their mortgages in cents.

Half Cents were not much used even when they were current in circulation in the early parts of the 19th century. For the most part, they were scarcely seen in commerce after the 1820s at the latest, which is why there are many 1820s-1830s + the Braided Hair Half Cents in au-unc condition. During that time, they were competing with foreign coins as well such as Spanish 1/2 reales (1/2 real being equivalent to 6 1/4 cents.) They were actively hoarded by the time of their demise in 1857 since the copper in the Half Cent was worth quite a bit more than the nominal 0.5 cent denomination, and by that time, change in general was hoarded and merchants were using fractional currency, store cards and other privately-issued means of making change.

I can't think of many transactions where they would have been exceedingly useful even back then. Perhaps staple goods such as milk, wheat, oats, etc. which were sometimes sold in half-cent quantities, e.g. milk 5 & 1/2 cents per gallon, so on.

This is what I was getting at in my first post

Assuming you found a great deal on common date Half Cents and could buy them in very worn / damaged condition for $30 each, you'd need to spend $6,360 to buy those 212 Half Cents to make such a video possible.

How much was the copper in a Half Cent worth in 1857? Hmmm... I can't find the historical data to go back that far. Does anyone know? I'm wonder how much the copper was worth in the Half Cent in 1857 to see how much times face it was when people started to hoard it.

And wait they were discontinued in 1857 and demonetized and monetized as legal tender in 1965?

If you look into it not long ago many places had coins called Mills. They came in either 1/10 or 1/2 of a Cent and were used to pay taxes on items. I have a roll of them from Missouri.

Duly noted, Conder. Thank you for the corrections.

Gas is usually taxed at Half Cent intervals. You could try and get a gallon of gas and use one Half Cent instead of letting them round up the tax on the sale. It could be a pretty interesting legal issue too. How many people get overcharged daily when filling up their vehicle?