Australian And New Zealand Coins, How Far Back Can We Go - First Edition

1954 Australian Royal Visit and ordinary florins:

Welcome to 1953. We had some loading speed difficulties before.
Hopefully its working now.

My New Zealand includes all 8 coins issued. In addition to the usual 7 coins, we had a 1 off crown issued.





I was lucky to have a almost Uncirculated Halfcrown, the Halfcrowns and Florins are scarce for 1953 (200k each or so).

The Crowns commemorated the Royal Visit of the Queen and Prince Philip. They arrived on Dec 22 1953 and left for Australia on Feb 1 1954.

The Crowns were minted in England and 250k were made with 7k issued as Proofs with the 7k Proof sets.
Standard coins came in the same Black plastic cases as the UK 1953 crowns.

Old photo sorry.

These coins were a flop unlike the 1949 Crowns, mainly as those coins sold at Face Value and were 50% Silver, these were base cupronickel and sold at 5/6 each, the extra 6d being the cost of the case. The design of Maori carvings by James Berry was very mediocre too. They were released in September 1953 so were NOT coronation crowns in reality.

The rest of 1953 included the following



Only the Penny and 3d had fairly high mintages, the others were 6 figures only, including 720k for the ½d, 250k for the 6d and 1/-, 2/- and just 120k for the Halfcrown, 2nd lowest after 1961.

7k of each were minted for the Proof set, which included the crown. I have been trying to buy one for a while and they are not cheap, many are stained or impaired and the cases which are red are often stained and falling apart.



All 8 coins together, I am really lucky most are AU or UNC and the worst like the Bronze are still almost EF.

Tomorrow we bring on King George VI

1953 New Zealand penny and crown:

Then it shall be done, I will be sending some letters off to various people this week.

1952 was an interesting year in NZ coinage, no Halfcrowns or Florins were issued for the first time since 1939. There had been a huge abundance of coin issuing from 3d to 2/6 between 1947 and 1950 due to silver being phased out and cupronickel pieces replacing them. 1951 saw a big issue of most denominations and many remained in the vaults as they were not needed.

Most 1952 dated coins along with 1951 were put into circulation only in 1963 (High values) and 1966(Bronze) as that was when coin shortages started to show. Hence why many 1951/52 coins are often found in VF/EF condition, whilst 1947/50 coins are often VG/Fine in most cases.






Here my group is AU shilling and Halfpenny and the others are EF (Again above average, but not perfect). If Pepactonius coins are A+ and average pieces are Cs and Ds, these coins are solid B/B+ examples.

All coins had high mintages except the shilling which only had 600k minted. The Penny had a mintage of 10.8 million, the highest for George VI coins and highest until 1964.

We also say hi to King George the Sixth, these coins back to 1948 have that effigy, but before 1948 it is George VI Emperor.

Not as nice as Princetane's! My 1952 Aussie florin:

Looking good, everyone!