Saor Alba

One of the nicer designs, from an interesting place with a fascinating history: These are from Salt Spring Island BC, an island with a population of approximately 10.000 people south of Victoria Island in British Columbia. These notes have been issued in fairly small quantities since 2001 and feature designs by local artists featuring individuals from the island.

Their is a bit of irony in the quote on the reverse of the Iranian 100.000 rials note. I like the Jugoslavian note, they really should make a rule that only pretty girls should be portrayed on banknotes.

His visit to Scotland was important for very many reasons, it had been since Charles I's coronation in Scotland in 1633 since a British monarch visited Scotland - nearly 200 years! There were many commemorative medallions struck, and Leith Banking Company even issued a One Pound note that commemorated his visit - one of the first commemorative banknotes ever. After so long being more or less a backwater the Scots finally felt as though they were part of Britain.

Nice notes and images of them MM.

'43 steel cent from the Philly cheese mint. It is like the 7th or 8th steel cent I have found in the last year.

One of those mysteriously enigmatic notes that appears from time to time in auctions. In the European pursuit of colonialising Africa during the early 20th century four world powers sought one of the crown jewels based on location. We all know in real estate that location location location is key to property. And one side of the Pillars of Hercules, Straits of Gibraltar lay Gibraltar(zealously controlled by Great Britain) and Spain of course. The other side, in what is now Morocco, was pursued by France, Great Britain, Spain, and Germany. Of course nobody asked or really cared what the residents in what is now Morocco thought, and they rebelled with the assistance of an adventurous Englishman, Captain C. Gardiner pursued independence of the Europeans: The government of the Riff existed for a brief period in the early 1920's before having been defeated by the Spaniards. Captain Gardner took it upon himself to print these notes, which is quite apparent that they were printed in Great Britain with references in English and to English money and curiously not pesetas.

Indeed, the French Indochina notes are seemingly common - until you want one in high grade. Nice find.

Oh you really need to get the 10000 Francs from Polynesia. I like the Trinidad $100.

In the last week, a 1939 nickel, a 1952-D cent, and a 1970-S nickel from change.

Printer's proof from ABNCo, curiously this is of the 1909 issue. All Puerto Rican notes are quite scarce, particularly the issues from after the American rule began in 1898.

I love finding the S's in my cent box searches, and really really like getting S mint wheats, now they are the bomb.

While I was at the market buying up dinner stuff for my huge family, I spied a '59 YH QEII from Canada in the penny dish. Had to buy it. It even has a bit of original red lustre in it.

Makes you wish the porter stumbled and dumped his rider - but then again the porter would have been severely punished, so maybe not. At least the photograph exists to testament the perfidy of the situation.

I have friends that still admire Stalin, a lot of people in the former USSR do. I remember having a discussion in Tienanmen Sq. a few years ago that turned to Mao and very rapidly ended because of the police that were all around us. Crazily enough I found anti communist books in English language bookstores in China though - the authorities don't mind what they cannot understand apparently.

1974 Canadian 10 cents.

Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill would qualify in 21st century terminology of dictator. He basically despised the Supreme Court, circumvented the US constitution and dared anyone to challenge him. He had an arrogance to him unbecoming of a leader of the United States. He was on a personal "mission" to destroy everybody he "thought" was responsible for allegedly killing his beloved wife. So political opponents, the congress, the Supreme Court, they were all made into enemies.

Canadian 5 cent and a Bufferson.

It is funny you mentioned that because the past few days I have gotten several 1965-69 Washers that are nearly BU. See above, early stuff is coming out of the woodwork because people need to spend it.

Just stick to sniffing Elmer's, it is harmless.

Cause it was hiddipated on the Coin Finds

'Twas waiting for me at the bank this morn. Also bought a box of cents, will report on those later but it was my best cent box ever for number of finds.

'54-D Lincoln at the PO this morning.

This note is a commemorative note issued by Estonia to mark the 90th anniversary of Estonia first declaring independence from Russia in 1918. There is much more symbolism in this note than the texts will attest to though. The 10 krooni note was the last banknote issued by the independent state of Estonia before the USSR overran the country again in 1940. Curiously a few years ago in the old treasury building the plates for the 1940 issue were uncovered by a worker doing some restoration on the building, they were found under some cabinets where they remained stashed for over 50 years. Because they could use these original plates as a basis for doing a commemorative note - Eesti Pank decided to incorporate the elements of the old 10 krooni note on this commemorative issue. While the front of the note is the old design from the first Estonian Republic, the reverse represents the current design of the 10 krooni note now in circulation - however the earlier note was a larger note and so this one is in the earlier dimensions.

'74 Canadian 5 cent coin in the coinstar, and $3 on the ground at the grocery store.

This is one of those wildly popular amongst world banknote collectors notes. Great artistry coupled with wonderful printing and dramatic imagery combine to mystify one with the intriguing subjects here. Curiously though, while this note is popular, and relatively common despite it's now advanced age; it is quite difficult to find a truly uncirculated one as these notes saw heavy usage right up until the German inflationary period of 1920-1924. The front of the note has a lovely vignette of "Germania" with a toddler who is launching a dove with an olive branch overlooking the Baltic Sea, not exactly the imagery you would expect in the Prussian dominated Germany of the era. The most dramatic and evocative image on the note is on the reverse however. This dragon, with his smoking snort guarding a reliquary is just fantastic and is what makes this note so popular. Given that I wanted the note in the best condition possible, it pretty much predicated a long delay in purchasing one. This note is the scarcer six digit serial variety that was printed before WWI, the notes with seven digits were printed after the war and in much greater quantities.