marianne

I couldn't wait for my issue of the Numismatist to arrive, so I read your article online and enjoyed it thoroughly. What an odd and charming character (John Krohn, not you, Bill!). Do you think the bet that allegedly prompted his first trek, and the whole "benefactor" angle, was a marketing ploy?

1759 West Friesland 2 stuivers.

Not... enough... coffee. I just posted something 10 years too late and removed it...

I keep mistaking this thread for the "Let's count backwards from..." one in the Asylum, and ignoring it.

1764

My next one's 1764.

My 1901 Maundy set arrived today, and it manages to make grumpy old Queen Victoria look gorgeous.

Denmark 1 skilling 1771. Clawed by angry hedgehogs.

Oops - I do have a 1771. I'll post it tomorrow unless someone else wants to jump in.

I wish that split grading were more common. According to the ANA grading book, at least 3 letters in "Liberty" must be visible for a grade of F-12, but I do think the reverse is in that range.

Friends keep bringing me coins that they've had sitting around for years - inherited or from their childhood collections. I don't pretend to know more than the basics, but it's good practice for me and I can at least start them off in the right direction. It was fun to discover this 20 cent piece in an old change purse, buried in corroded Canadian cents.

I'm thinking VG-8, but this is the first one of these I've seen in person.

Downward!

The only coin shop in my area is just down the street from me. So close, and yet... so frustrating.

The owner carries only a handful of non-U.S. coins, and he dips everything. Coins with obvious wear are shiny as doorknobs.

I keep popping back in, hoping something decent will turn up. Last week, a hapless potential customer was fleeing out the door as I arrived.

"Come on in," the dealer told me. "I won't be mean to YOU." So I scaled the "Cash paying customers only beyond this point" barrier and got an earful about the impending collapse of fiat money.

I've tried to draw him out about coins, but he only wants to talk about the need to hoard gold.

When I tell him what I'm looking for, he'll say, "Oh, I used to have a bunch of those." Then he starts suggesting completely unrelated coins.

The last time I bought something from him (I try), he emerged from the back room to give me a handful of worn, pre-war Jefferson nickels and a Sackie. It isn't often that I feel 8 years old again.

It would be great to give my local dealer more business and learn more about coins while I'm at it. I've about given up, though.

Bump, get me back to 1829 and I've got a few.

1830

1845. Ugly, but it works...

1891

I found a copy of Nederlandse Munten 1795-1975 by Jacques Schulman here in the U.S. It gives more details about varieties than Krause does. Now I need to reexamine all the edge lettering on a bunch of coins.

1971

I'm not sure which I covet more - your token or Sailor Jean's trolleyette. Researching him must have been a lot of fun.

These came today, thanks in large part to help from T_3:

Money through the Centuries and Money of the Kingdom. I've already found answers to some questions, and that's while reading with a Dutch-English dictionary clutched in one hand.