| Author |
 Replies: 87 / Views: 11,281 |
|
Valued Member
Canada
85 Posts |
Well my grandmother passed away a few months ago and we have all been cleaning out her house and getting ready to sell it. I asked my dad if he checked out the attic and he said yes. I decided to go up and take a look (Im an adventurous girl!). Yeah, I don't really like spiders but I thought, the heck with it why not just go up and see if anything was forgotten. I'm kind of like that, I don't want to leave behind a single thing, I think anything from a loved ones previous life is precious. So I head on up and look around. At the very end of the attic I see a safe, oddly enough it wasn't locked it was just closed. Which I guess is a good thing because safe cracking aint my thing! I open it up and see piles of these 'jewelry boxes' among other things. So I call my dad and my uncle up and they couldn't believe I found this. So it was pretty dark so we just started unloading the safe as it was too heavy to carry. After we got everything out this is what we found! [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/853/shawn003.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/707/shawn004.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/600/shawn005.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/41/shawn006.jpg/]  [/URL] What are those? Well this is everything we found (plus a lot more duplicates!) Canadian Silver Dollars (all mint and never in circulation): An Entire collection times 3 from 1951-1985 Canadian One Cent Large Pennies (circulated): 1881-1920 Canadian 50 cent pieces: From 1920-1958 (a few years are missing) Canadian quarters: 1946-1967 Canadian nickels: 1927-1968 Small Penny: on the coin box it says 1920-1936, 1937-1947, 1948-1952, 1953 Dimes: 1907-1964 30-40 banknotes from early 1900's $10 Canadian Bill from 1937 9 $1 canadian bills (never circulated or oit of plastic) 1867-1967 10 $2 bills (never in circulation) So that's all the coins and paper money we found in the safe! And the coolest thing was inside the safe she left all the coins and money to me! How neat! Along with all these coins were 9 troy ounces of gold and 15 binders of stamps (the stamps were in an old chest) Im not sure if the coins are worth anything but is it safe to say I am now a coin collector? |
|
|
|
Valued Member
United States
493 Posts |
Coins are all worth something!, and it's great knowing your grandparents were wise and took value in collecting them. You can shop ebay or get a coin book to find values on any/all. |
|
Valued Member
 Canada
85 Posts |
Sorry if I posted this in the wrong area. I'm just a little excited and who better to share with, a coin forum! Now you guys are really not going to believe this but after writing this I thought I better go and look in the safe again and make sure we didnt miss anything and to just check around a little more. And Guess what? I found this behind the safe! [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/832/shawn001.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/9/shawn002.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/543/shawn003.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/854/shawn004.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/844/shawn005.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/146/shawn006.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/545/shawn007.jpg/]  [/URL] [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/815/shawn008.jpg/]  [/URL] Well that's all the pictures I just took of what was inside that tin box. I have no idea what to do with all this stuff, I know absolutely nothing about coins! I guess I'll just get a safety deposit box and hide them away. There are so many coins I don't even know what to do. Sure they are nice to look at but I really don't know anything about this kind of stuff. I hope you guys enjoyed my story and pictures! Sorry if it was boring for you all ;) |
|
Pillar of the Community
Australia
1244 Posts |
Cute, now you have lots of coins to learn about.
What a cleaver granny, mine was the same, had a few coins that I had to slowly sort thru. But wow your granny had a large collection.
I sold one coin that had a damaged box, but I still find it hard to look at her stuff.
|
|
Valued Member
Canada
85 Posts |
So I was looking more at the coins and I came across this one. It tells me the date which is 1939 but it doesn't tell me what it is. It must be a penny of some sort. Does anyone know? [URL="http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/859/shawn013.jpg/]  [/URL] |
|
Valued Member
Canada
85 Posts |
"Cute, now you have lots of coins to learn about.
What a cleaver granny, mine was the same, had a few coins that I had to slowly sort thru. But wow your granny had a large collection.
I sold one coin that had a damaged box, but I still find it hard to look at her stuff."
Yeah she sure did, wow.
Oops I'm not sure why that picture is so blurry. Basically, it's really thick on the back, it has two kings? looking sideways. The one king you can see the entire side of his face, while the other you can only see half the face as it's cut short by the other guys face. On the other side it looks like a piece of map and on the coin this all it says.
regem et reginam canada salvtat amar vsq ve ad mare
|
|
Valued Member
United States
56 Posts |
First of all  to the CCF family crystalH And yes, I wold say from your excitement, you are officially a collector !  Unfortunately, I cant be much help with your specific questions as I do not collect Canadian coins or notes, only United States. I am sure other members here will be of LOTS of help to you so ask any questions you may have.But, I must add, if I had my hands on all that, I sure could get a good start collecting Canadian coins and currency!  And your story and pictures are FAR from boring to me - I loved it WOW! Congratulations on inheriting such a wonderful group of items, although I sincerely give you my condolences on the loss of your grandmother. Edited by gwcregger
05/17/2011 03:22 am
|
|
Pillar of the Community
Canada
838 Posts |
First, to who I'm assuming is another fellow Canadian here on CCF. You will have lots of fun going through your grandma's collection! (And by the sounds of the gold and silver, you have an instant investment!) Regarding the "thick" coin, I suspect it's a confederation medallion. They're pretty common and cheap, but that way you can look out for the other ones (I know there's a similar one from 1927, for instance) and make a mini-set! |
|
Moderator
 Australia
16826 Posts |
Your copper "coin" is not a coin, it's a medal, commemorating the 1939 Royal Visit to Canada. The two people on the obverse are King George VI and his wife, Queen Elizabeth (the current queen's mother). You can see a line drawn on the map; this is the route the Royal Train took across the country.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
|
|
Valued Member
United States
417 Posts |
GREAT FIND :) Now you are hooked. Good luck discovering the history of the coins. The gold is a great find in today's times.
|
|
Rest in Peace
United States
9104 Posts |
Let me give you a quick idea of the minimum value:
Add up the face (spending) value of the silver coins, dime to dollar.
Multiply by 17.
Add $13,500.
That's what they're worth just for their silver and gold content. If there are rare dates, the figure could be considerably higher.
AFAIK, all Canadian paper money is still good, with large size notes all worth a premium over face.
Count yourself extremely lucky. Your grandparents may have been wise to stash these coins, but you came this close to losing what looks to be several thousand dollars in inheritance. Hopefully, anyone reading this will remember to keep similar treasures known, or put a note in their safe deposit box, or mention them in their will.
I wonder how your grandparents got the safe into the attic, if you found it too heavy to move? I'd be stringing some extension cords up there and doing a thorough search. Also, check for numbered flat keys that would open a safe deposit box.
Put another way, based on your description, I'd be comfortable offering you $15,000, and figure I'd make about $5,000, not counting any unlisted goodies.
|
|
Bedrock of the Community
United States
20753 Posts |
Quote:
I wonder how your grandparents got the safe into the attic, if you found it too heavy to move? I'd be stringing some extension cords up there and doing a thorough search. Also, check for numbered flat keys that would open a safe deposit box.
One of the first things I wondered about too. Possibly when they were a lot younger they were a lot stronger than you. Of course as they added stuff to that safe, it got heavier. One thing I'd like to mention is to not spread that story around to to many relatives, friends and neighbors. You've fot a lot of value there and stories of such a collection could spread just to much. If you need someone to hold all those for a while, let me know. I've volunteer.  |
|
Pillar of the Community
Canada
1733 Posts |
definitely post up some of the Canadian coins in the Canadian sub forum, especially the cents, the small Canadian pennies from 23-27 are key dates, and many of the large cents have varieties.
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
830 Posts |
One tip on the blurry pic, see if your camera has a macro setting for close ups.
|
|
Pillar of the Community
United States
609 Posts |
WOW! I'm so jealous! I would do like biggfredd said and do a thorough search of the attic. And anywhere else they might have stashed some coins. I wish my grandparents collected coins...
|
|
Bedrock of the Community
United States
19947 Posts |
Welcome to CC and thanks for sharing your finds!
That is so AWESOME! This is your chance to learn about coin collecting and to get started in the hobby. Study what you have, catalog it all and learn.
|
| |
Replies: 87 / Views: 11,281 |
Posted 05/17/2011 02:41 am
