What Brought You Back To Collecting?

There is no back I never left. Been collecting continuously since February 1972, been studying coins since December 1966.

My dad initially got me started as a kid in the mid-1970's. Then, after high school, my collection mostly sat through the 1980's until I picked it back up around 1989/1990. After a few years, it went on the backburner until the State Quarter program was introduced in 1999. Then a new house came along in the mid 2000's and the collection got pushed aside once again. Now, I'm back at it for the 3rd or 4th time. So, it's been off and on collecting for at least the past 35+ years. During those "down years" the most I did was search through change. I worked retail in the mid-late 1980's and remember pulling all kinds of coins out of the cash register. Silver Kennedy's were very common to find, along with wheats. I also have several rolls of silver Washington's that I put together just from pulling them from the cash register. Had I been smart enough to coin roll hunt then, who knows what I would have accumulated. A few years ago, I also pulled out my 1977 and 1978 Topps Baseball Cards to see what I was missing, and decided to finish those sets as well.

I inherited part of my father's coin collection late last year and I wanted to "fill in the gaps" after the sets were split up between my brothers and myself.

My father essentially stopped collecting after 1964, so he never really got me started in the hobby as a kid in the mid to late sixties. I knew he had a collection, and would show it to us on occasion, but as a child with essentially no money, I didn't take up the hobby.

As a teenager and beyond, I was more interested in girls! lol

I am too, many times over!

I'm now looking forward to introducing the older ones to collecting and if any of them show an interest I'll have a junior partner to share my hobby with.

I left the country in 1990 and stopped collecting at the time. I occupied my time with my career and family. My hobbies were my son's. I got into Thomas Trains at one point and then dinosaur tooth collecting when he was into dinosaurs. Then it was Pokemon for 7 years. Then it was onto independent activities so I had to find something else to do. Coins was still there. Some of them had exploded in price. Some were a lot cheaper. I dug out my old collection and updated my grading and pricing standards and got back into it quickly.

Got back into metal detecting after about a 30 year lapse.
Since then, I've dug several hundred silver coins including about 20 halves. Dozens of IH's, many coppers mid-1800's, seated, even a 1758 Spanish silver here in lower Mich. It's a rewarding and really relaxing hobby.

always wanted to have something unique

Nice thread !

As others above, I collected as a kid, between 1969 and 1975, living on bicycling distance from the Jacques Schulman office at the Keizersgracht in Amsterdam. What a place ! The Schulman family was (and still is) truly inspiring. So much knowledge about coins, and patience with a youngster who could spend a small sum (earned by weeks of handcleaning tulip bulbs from the fields before drying => export to the US).

Next came studies, founding a family, getting the job done. Collecting on hold until 1995 during a business trip to Stockholm, where far away from home, an attractive 1592 "Prince taler" featuring William of Orange was waiting for a small price to rekindle the fire of collecting. With another great numismatic family in Brussels nearby, Jean Elsen and sons, it was not difficult to get the warmth of the hobby back.

Above the point of being grandpa was quoted by DeputyMax

So right! My three grandsons enjoy more and more the moments with grandpa and his coins. They started with a small box for each. Eager to learn about past times - stories of princes and kings and ships and treasures. So I hope they will continue with what I have experienced as a great way to understand our own past.