My nephew is 16 and getting into coins, which is great. He has about 100 rolls of 1972 cents he's going thru that my Grandmother and I rolled up in 1975 and 1976. He found either an FS-103 or FS-108, due to pics I cant really tell. I thought I woukd buy him a CherryPickers Guide like I have, so I jumped on Amazon and Holy crap. Someone has a 5th Edition listed for $902.00?!?!. I see on ebay they are selling at a premium as well. Apparently these are out of print now? Are there any other better resources available today? My collecting has been dormant for several years, so I am a bit out of touch.
It looks like your best bet for the book is to buy a Kindle and then get the $15 Kindle version on Amazon. Alternatively, you can use online references. My favorite is http://www.varietyvista.com.
Here is a link to the 1972s you are talking about:
For me, a cherry picker is a guy who scours through dealers junk bins of World coins up to a nominal value of perhaps up to $20 per coin.
The bulk of my World collection has been built up in this manner, over period of perhaps more than 40 years. It includes coins of all centuries ancient to modern. By searching in this manner, the whole of numismatics is opened up to bargain hunting (cherry picking). As such, a specialist kindle would be of very minimal use to me.
U.S. coins are just part of my World coin collection - I have about 100 or so U.S. coins - mainly silver and 19th century bronze. Australian coins are very much under-represented.
The prices are nuts, I sold my 5th editions on ebay for easily 10 times what I paid. The new version is in the works and was scheduled to come out in September, but it's been knocked back and will now likely come out in July 2021.
"Buy the Book Before You Buy the Coin" - Aaron R. Feldman - "And read it" - Me 2013! ANA Life Member #3288 in good standing since 1981, ANS, Early American Coppers Member (EAC), Colonial Coin Collectors Club member (C4), Conder Token Collector Club member (CTCC), Civil War Token Society (CWTS) member, Liberty Seated Collectors Club (LSCC) & Numismatic Bibliomania Society member (NBS), USMex, Member in good standing, 2¢ variety collector.
I might also add if you're going to have a bunch of cent rolls to search through then 1972's are just what you want, lots of various interesting varieties in that date alone, plus some that are worthy of a few dollars or hundreds even!
"Buy the Book Before You Buy the Coin" - Aaron R. Feldman - "And read it" - Me 2013! ANA Life Member #3288 in good standing since 1981, ANS, Early American Coppers Member (EAC), Colonial Coin Collectors Club member (C4), Conder Token Collector Club member (CTCC), Civil War Token Society (CWTS) member, Liberty Seated Collectors Club (LSCC) & Numismatic Bibliomania Society member (NBS), USMex, Member in good standing, 2¢ variety collector.
Thanx for the feedback. I will keep an eye out for the new edition. Redbooks I have, lots of them, going back to 1958. Its interesting to see how some of the grading standards have changed over time.
Salmotrutta you are correct, the changes since I started in collecting have been overwhelming at times, I began collecting way before third party grading and slabbing. I've found the two best things that really kicked me into high gear on getting pretty good at grading coins (I only do US coins) were three things:
1. Finding a good mentor to help guide me along the way (in my case it was several different people).
2. Attend several American Numismatic Association ( ANA) summer seminars for a week or two each in Colorado Springs. Get your nephew joined up and have him apply for a scholarship, that's how I went the first time totally free for me, the ANA scholarship covered everything, and I spent almost two weeks with Q. David Bowers in a classroom, surrounded by other very bright and youthful minds (several from that class went on to great things, one created a grading company, one has a Pulitzer prize in journalism, one is a Federal Court Judge in New York, two are multi millionaire coin dealers (one has bought and sold every imaginable rarity you can think of), a few of us are just normal people, lol.
3. Look at lots and lots of coins, I'm lucky to live very close to a major auction house with weekly sales, where I can go and inspect ten of thousands of coins every year, hand on in a quite room like a TPG grading room for free. Can't beat that.
Knowing your nephew is 16 then assume he is more the video watching generation than us old time book reading guys, get him to subscribe to the ANA's YouTube channel there are many great videos posted, like this one:
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There are literally months worth of good, well produced, and family safe, material produced by the ANA, the Neuman Numismatic Portal, and the American Numismatic Association (ANS).
The ANA is currently offering a special Young Numismatist discount for under 17 years old, take advantage of it.
If there is anything I can answer more or help with don't hesitate to reach out, we need more good kids in the hobby to take over from us old guys and gals. You made a good start by joining up here at the CCF!
"Buy the Book Before You Buy the Coin" - Aaron R. Feldman - "And read it" - Me 2013! ANA Life Member #3288 in good standing since 1981, ANS, Early American Coppers Member (EAC), Colonial Coin Collectors Club member (C4), Conder Token Collector Club member (CTCC), Civil War Token Society (CWTS) member, Liberty Seated Collectors Club (LSCC) & Numismatic Bibliomania Society member (NBS), USMex, Member in good standing, 2¢ variety collector.
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Posted 07/21/2021 02:15 am
