u/TristanDuboisOLG

The here have been very few times when I have considered “chasing” a coin because of the toning. This was one of them.

I picked this up the other day as an example for my type set. Yes, photo is of the exact coin. It’s in an ANACS holder and graded AU 55 - Full Head.

I’ve never been a standing liberty quarter guy, but then again, I very rarely ever see them in this high grade, or with this sort of eye appeal. Generally coins from this period had issues minting. For example, walking liberty halves also have quite a bit of trouble having good strikes.

I’m excited to try and get a higher grade example for my type 2 now! Or should I aim for a key date?

I was going through some of my lower grade large sized notes and found this $10.

It actually features the first treasure of the United States on the front. His name was Michael Hillegas. Apparently his family thought he had been mostly forgotten and petitioned to have his portrait on the $10 Gold. I believe you can also see it on the earlier 1907 version of this note.

I managed to complete the short set!

The $5, $10, and $20 are somewhat attainable. But if anyone has a $50 for the First national bank of Bangor Maine, let me know!

Now I’ll have to make a display of some sort!

My father was always really good at finding me Christmas presents that were awesome.

This is a note that I very rarely see. The red seal 1928 US note. These were released in Puerto Rico to help with some economic issues at the time.

I almost always surprise people with this when sharing collection pictures. Thought it might be neat to share here today.

Another small sized note for you all today. This was the first small sized note released when the US modernized their currency in the 1920s to save on paper costs.

The nickname “funnyback” comes from the design of the “one” on the reverse of the bill. A lot of people compared it to play money.

These are actually fairly common. I would recommend looking for a nice example if you don’t have one yet. There are also some experimental paper notes produced on specific plates. (X and Y I believe?)

I absolutely love the solid stars on the earlier notes. I was going through and documenting some of my earlier collection when I found these.

Maybe I’ll see if I can post some small more sized currency!

Noticed something different with the 7s when purchasing this.

Then noticed that it also had a shadow of the date above the 1 and other 7s. Turns out the “cud” or whatever it was inside the 7s was the tail of some sort of underdate?

What would this be called?

https://imgur.com/a/NYyXs7n

Barber 1/2 Dollar XF - 1908-S - $300 Shipped obo

Draped Bust 1/2 Cent AG - 1805 (Stemless) - $50 Shipped

Bought these when I was younger, now I'm thinking I may want nicer examples. The barber was cleaned originally, but still has strong XF details. Selling below XF ask because of the cleaning.

1805 half cent has seen some shit. Example is worn but I'm hoping someone will enjoy it. Numista variety example was added to the thumbnail for comparison if needed.

Prices are OBO within reason.
Paypal only, USPS to Continental US

The Flying Eagle cent was the first “small” cent that was struck in the USA. Originally, we had much larger copper cents. The rising prices of copper, along with the amount you would need to carry to pay for things, caused popularity of these large coppers to drop.

In 1856, 2-3k of these flying eagles were struck and distributed to the government in an attempt to sway them to move to a much smaller design for the penny. This small mintage had become a holy grail for collectors now.

The problem with the flying eagle cents is that they didn’t mint up well. Eventually it lead to them being replaced by the Indian Cent in 1859. So, if you find a decently struck one, I highly recommend picking up one with great details.

I’ve had several coins that photographed well, but this one just didn’t. In person, this is a fantastic coin. Here, the photograph just didn’t do it justice.

The 1829 half dime was the first year a half dime had been minted since the draped bust series ended in 1805. At the time, the US was still relying somewhat heavily on foreign coinage and by 1829, we were ready for production of the 5 cent piece to start again.

I’ve been looking for a good deal on a good example of one of these for quite some time. I managed to pick this one up at auction the other day for quite a good price. As you can see, the reverse does have a die crack above the eagle. But the front has a fantastic strike. All the stars are detailed and the hair is very sharp.

I’m quite happy with this example for my type.

The Nova Constellatio is a post colonial “pattern coin”. (Existing after the formation of the country but before any official coinage was commissioned or struck). They were minted in England in the mid 1780s specifically in an attempt to produce coinage for the US. These would eventually have denominations on them, but the 1785 I have here does not. (You have to turn it just right to see the date)

I’m also quite happy to say that this is roughly the same size as a large penny, so it fits nicely with my Fugio and Hard Times tokens. (Yes, I know they are not commemorative half dollars)

The red book prices this at maybe $125 for VG. My LCS asked for close to that. Even though this is arguably worse than VG, I paid it. But what he doesn’t know, is that these things go for 2-3x that on eBay even in this shape.

Overall, pretty happy with this example.

Good afternoon all!

I recently attended an estate auction and while I picked up a few rarities that I was gunning for, this half dollar caught my eye.

Normally I attempt to collect stuff for my 7070 in XF or higher. But this coin has very nice fields and seemed very problem free.

It had a VF grade on it. What do you think? Could it pull a 40?

Here’s my example of a lettered edged capped bust half in my Dansco 7070.

For those of you that are unaware of what the lettered edged variety is, these coins were minted with a three part press. That allowed the coins to be engraved on the edge as well. (Similar to some of the modern dollar coins if you haven’t seen it before).

This example was in pretty decent shape. My father always said that because they have a relatively high silver content, banks would hoard them to use as bullion backing in their vaults, so you see them in higher grade often.

This one has an issue I’ve seen of the capped bust design often. For those silver capped busts, (h10c, 10c, 25c, and 50c) that feature the eagle on the reverse, it seems as though there were often strikes that partially showed through onto the obverse. On the picture above, it presents as a shadow that follows the curve of the chin.

Of course, all of these dies were engraved manually in Philadelphia at the time. So there are a LOT of varieties and variations that came from the manual presses and engraving.

Hope you enjoy!

Good morning everyone! On my way back from vacation. I thought I would share one of my favorite fractional notes.

What we have here is a 15¢ fractional note.

This note was issued during the civil war where uncertainty in fiat currency (paper money) caused people hoard all of the pocket change. Without the release of fractional currency, making change was next to imposible.

This series is actually fairly interesting because of who was *supposed* to be on it. Originally the third issue would have a portrait of Sherman and Ulysses S. Grant on it, but there was a recently passed law that dictated that currency and coin wouldn’t feature any living people on it. Part of this is because they didn’t want people to have any accidental political clout simply because they were widely recognized on the coin.

The other part of this story features a rather eccentric man at the Treasury department that took an obvious and easily understood order and used it as an excuse to print his own face on a bill.

I for one really enjoy the third issue fractionals. They were released right around the same time as the “Rainbow Notes” and have a very similar color gradient to the paper if you can find one in good shape.

Sometimes their comes a time when collecting when you know you’re going to take a long break. College was a time that I knew I wouldn’t be able to spend on coins again for a long time.

So, I tried to buy something that would be relatively expensive for me at the time. So, I purchased this from my local coin shop. (A rarity to see)

The 1899 $5 actually had an interesting controversy surrounding it. The Chief depicted on the bill is the only Native American ever featured on US currency. But, the picture that the engraver based the design off of was actually quite different.

Running Antelope,(featured on the bill), was actually wearing a traditional 3 feathered headdress. Unfortunately, the engraver decided that the original headdress didn’t fit the space he was working in, and substituted it for a Pawnee war bonnet.

This was a huge problem. Running Antelope was a Lakota, and they had extremely poor relations with the Pawnee. This was a huge insult culturally. Which is very interesting considering the popularity of the note and how iconic it’s become.

Well, that’s it for me this week. I’m on vacation so I won’t be posting notes everyday. I hope you liked my little history lesson!

We took a break yesterday from posting, but today I wanted to continue the 1899 silver certificate series by posting the $2 bill.

The $2 1899 silver certificate has two interesting things to know about it. It’s nicknames the “Mini-Porthole” because it features a portrait ringed with a border that is somewhat similar to the $5 1923 “Porthole”. (We may have to make a post about that one later).

While George Washington is prominently featured on the $1, he also appeared on the 1863-64 $100 interest bearing notes,and the $20 Gold Certificate in 1918 and 1922. But this is the only $2 bill he’s featured on.

I had a tough time bringing myself to purchase this note when I was first starting my collection. I was never really a fan of the design. But now that some years have gone by, they have really gone up in price. I still kick myself for not picking one up.

Oh well, you never know what the next auction will bring!

This is the first note I purchased as a young collector. Before this it was all pulled from pocket change.

I remember having a problem figuring out grades for coins, and the relative ease of counting creases or stains really appealed to me comparatively.

The Black Eagle replaced the $1 Educational series. You can just barely see the US Capitol poking out from behind the eagle.

This was one of the first big mix ups I had as a collector. The first bill I ever purchased was. $1 1899 BLACK eagle. I confused these almost constantly the first few years.

The Green Eagle was produced during World War 1. As such, the war actually did affect it. This bill was printed on 100% cotton instead of the linen that all bills were printed on previously.

I’m glad that I got a good image of it, but the scan did emphasize the wrinkles and folds. It does look a lot better in person. I highly recommend looking for a nice one of these bills as the back can be very striking.

Guess who found their scanner cable last night? On a related note, I now have more hood photos to share with you all of my currency collection!

This is my 1914 series red seal. For those of you that collect the 1914 series, you are probably familiar with the blue seal versions of these notes. For those that don’t, the red seal versions are *much* more difficult to find and *far* more expensive.

I went to an auction where this was being sold. It’s important when attending in-person coin and currency auction to get the auction early and look at the items before bidding. You never know what issues a photo may hide. (I’ve seen people hide scratches in reflections of the coin or holder)

This was a lesson I was about to learn the hard way.

The auctioneer laid out the terms of the auction. One of which was to “Open and inspect your coins and bills before leaving” as they said they couldn’t try and fix anything after you took possession and walked out the door.

I had taken several nights over the past week to look at the auction images online and see the full listing in the packet that had been mailed to me. But I hadn’t gotten to look at every lot I was interested in.

Well, this 1914 came up for sale. I hadn’t seen it personally, and it was in a very slick and low profile holder that completely encapsulated the bill. The auctioneer said, “ok folks, we didn’t mention it on the listing but this one has ***paper loss***.” I though that may mean it had a corner or something missing. So I bid on it and won.

Only to get home and discover the horror inside the holder as I swapped it into a better holder for my binder.

Paper loss (in this instance) can be described as the brittle sort of paper you would pull out of the over after 450 degrees for an hour. If you look very closely in the photo, the center of the bill basically fell apart in my hand, split almost to the base of Lincoln’s portrait. There is even a crumbled edge with a tear that feels as if it may break off at the slightest touch.

I was able to get the bill VERY carefully into a rigid holder. I’ve also made notes to never remove it. It now serves me as a constant reminder.

Always view the lots in person before you bid.

I’ve been showing a photo here and there for the last week or so of these coins. Here they all are together! Finally complete. Or at least the designs here are. Cents and the heraldic eagle.

I think that I’ll likely add some others to this collection in the far future. There are also the small eagle designs, and if I want to get really crazy, there is a gold bullion $10 from 2007 and the 1804 Best of the Mint that’s coming out later this year.

I think I may put a break on those given the price of gold at the moment.