NUMISMATICS IS THE FANCY WORD
Coin Collecting, the Hobby of Kings
But also a hobby for even the poorest of us
Years back, thousands of years back, the only coin collectors likely were royalty and other wealthy people. In one sense, anyone amassing money was a collector, but we think we know that some had a deeper interest in the designs or dates of the money they owned.
People still collect coins today. It’s a great hobby for the rich and for people of much more modest means. People keep samples of coins from countries they have visited — that is a coin collection. In the United States, some people try to find each of the various “State Quarters” our Mint issued from 1999 to 2009. Those are coin collections.
You might remember trying to fill each date in a little book made to hold Lincoln Cents. That would be a very large book today, with a lot of pennies in it! Lincoln Cents have been produced since 1909 and even though pennies are nearly worthless now and are often an annoyance, we still make them today.
A complete collection of Lincoln cents including every date and every mint that issued them (Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco) would be nearly impossible to collect from change today and quite expensive to buy. The same is true for Roosevelt Dimes and…
