Active Topics | Member List | Search | Help | Register | Login
The John Byrne Forum
Byrne Robotics > The John Byrne Forum Page of 2 Next >>
Topic: 1940 Nickel Post ReplyPost New Topic
Author
Message
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 10:33am | IP Logged | 1 post reply

In my change at the grocery store. As usual, I like to think about how many times it would have been spent in 79 years!
Back to Top profile | search
 
Phil Frances
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 08 August 2009
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 338
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 12:34pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

I have a few silver sixpences that I've accumulated over the years, including a 1940 Rhodesian version - whilst not from the UK, it does remind me it's from the same year as the Battle of Britain - like your nickel. And similarly, I occasionally wonder about all of the places it's been during it's long life, and whose hands it would have passed through ...

A lo-o-ong time though since I got any in change ; they were still around in circulation for a while after decimalisation in Britain, but that was (ulp!) 48 years ago.

And now I suddenly feel a lot older than I was when I started this post .... !
Back to Top profile | search e-mail
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 1:49pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

When my Dad died a whole bunch of random stuff came to me as part of my “inheritance”. One thing was a small wooden box containing his WW2 campaign medals and some loose British coins. Two were pennies, the old big ones. Worn so smooth they were barely identifiable. But one had a ghost’s whisper of the date, or at least the first two digits. 17- -!!
Back to Top profile | search
 
Eric Sofer
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 31 January 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 4789
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 2:03pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply

I once went to McDonald's for lunch, and when checking the change (as I usually do), I found an 1893 penny.

Yet strangely, this did not inspire me to visit McDonald's more often...
Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 2:08pm | IP Logged | 5 post reply

I’m remembering the replica Confederate bills that came with the cards in Civil War gum, back in the early Sixties. I collected a whole wad of them. Others likely did the same. I wonder how many children or grandchildren have found a shoebox full of “Confederate money” in Grampa’s old stuff, and raced to an appraiser expecting to retire.

LINK

Back to Top profile | search
 
Michael Penn
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 12 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 12406
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 2:45pm | IP Logged | 6 post reply

I wonder how many times that nickel was used to buy a Coke or make a phone call?


Back to Top profile | search
 
Doug Centers
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 17 February 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 5436
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 4:27pm | IP Logged | 7 post reply

I still set aside wheat pennies and buffalo nickles when I notice them. I have a drawer full, not sure what I'm going to do with them (collector gene at work).
Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 7:33pm | IP Logged | 8 post reply

I got a 1938 dime in my change, once, and immediately wondered if it might have bought a copy of ACTION COMICS #1. This time I wondered if that same comic might have been bought with this nickel, in a second hand book store in 1940.
Back to Top profile | search
 
Brian Floyd
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 07 July 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 8321
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 8:45pm | IP Logged | 9 post reply

Oldest coins I've ever gotten as change were quarters and nickels from the mid-60s. But I know someone who got a 1948 penny that way.

I own a 1971 dollar coin (the Apollo 11 insignia on the back), because that's the year I was born. I want a buffalo nickel and a 1976 quarter.




Back to Top profile | search e-mail
 
Jozef Brandt
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 03 March 2007
Location: United States
Posts: 2655
Posted: 21 August 2019 at 11:08pm | IP Logged | 10 post reply


When I was in high school and college, I worked graveyards in a 7-11 and over the course of two summers managed to get about 40-ish silver coins and pre-1950 pennies.  I could always hear the sound the silver made when I cracked a roll into the till.  This was the early 90s and some of the other coins I found in rolls from the bank were Peso coins, Russian coins, and Irish coins. 
Back to Top profile | search
 
John Byrne
Avatar
Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132129
Posted: 22 August 2019 at 6:26am | IP Logged | 11 post reply

A couple of decades back there was a sudden flood of old coins in the change I was getting in town. 1930s, 1940s vintage. Hundreds of them. For a while it took away the "thrill" of finding old coins.

I guessed that someone had died, and the family, cleaning out the estate, just started spending coins found in piggy banks (or whatever) without any consideration of their value.

Back to Top profile | search
 
Phil Frances
Byrne Robotics Member
Avatar

Joined: 08 August 2009
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 338
Posted: 22 August 2019 at 8:01am | IP Logged | 12 post reply

After my previous post, I went looking online to see if I could find an actual British 1940 silver sixpence to add to my small collection, and ended up finding a nice little set covering each year of WWII from 1939 to 1945, at a very good price.

Now I'm considering if I ought to do the same for the First World War ... collector gene at work, as Doug said ! 
Back to Top profile | search e-mail
 

Page of 2 Next >>
  Post ReplyPost New Topic
Printable version Printable version

Forum Jump
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot create polls in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum

 Active Topics | Member List | Search | Help | Register | Login