CONVENTIONAL WISDOM: THERE’S AN EASIER WAY TO LEARN VALUE OF A DOLLAR
By Dale Johnson
Our currency system works because there is no arguing about how much every piece of money is worth. If you owe someone twenty dollars they surely can’t argue when you give them a twenty-dollar bill. If you’re holding legal tender that’s green and carries Abraham Lincoln’s head on the front, it’s worth five dollars … well, unless you’re holding a really rusty penny. But that’s an exception to the rule. It’s safe to say that anything bearing George Washington’s image is worth a buck … ummm, wait … as long as it’s not a quarter. Then it would be worth 25 cents, except if it was minted before 1965, in which case it could be worth a whole lot more. Please don’t ask me how much.
Because that brings us back to the point I was making at the beginning: if you don’t know the value of a dollar, there’s no one to blame but yourself—because the Coin, Stamp and Collectible Expo has arrived at the Long Beach Convention Center this weekend to clear up everything.
The convention will feature 1,000 dealers selling rare coins, vintage paper money and other collectibles, and most of the dealers are willing to give free appraisals. There will also be educational seminars and collector’s club meetings, and Heritage Auctions will conduct a public auction of rare coins.
Excited? The woman who answered when I phoned Liberty Coin, a little collectors shop in Signal Hill, couldn’t wait … to transfer my call to somebody else. That turned out to be Ryan White, who said he’s worked at Liberty for eight years and has been collecting coins for 15. I let him know that I’ve been collecting coins for 23 years—my whole life—although I have spent most of them. He wasn’t amused.
White is part of what he described as a “large and very active” community of coin collectors in Greater Long Beach and he takes the pastime (read: obsession) seriously. He started collecting coins for the history of it all, and feels most local collectors have similar interests. “Most people primarily put their energy towards something creative,” White says. “Getting an entire set of coins or finding a rare series of some sort.”
As he speaks, I imagine the coin collector as an archeologist, tinking ancient stone with a delicate hammer to extract a slug of metal embossed with the image of a conquering ruler. Or as some Indiana Jones, if Indiana Jones spent his weekends pacing parks and beaches with a metal detector and a Walkman. But the most-common reality will be found among the people wandering the convention center floor at this weekend’s expo.
Not that rare coins aren’t still occasionally found in the wild. Coins like the Morgan Dollar, which White told me was the most sought item at his shop, are still in circulation … and some people fail to recognize them.
But other people do. Like my aunt. She works at a bank, and after handling money every day for nearly 20 years, she says some coins and currency just feel different. And awhile back, some poor bastard came to her window with a bevy of different-feeling coins—Morgan Dollar coins.
My aunt smiled, completed the man’s transaction by exchanging paper dollars for the metal ones and got him away from her window as fast as she could. Then she got out her own paper money, bought the coins from herself—well, the bank—and after work skipped happily to the coin shop, where she sold those Morgan Dollars for twenty bucks a pop.
Back on the phone, White seemed to scoff at my notion that people may not even realize which coins are rare. “People are pretty keen to what they have in their pockets,” he said. “When they see something that is out of the ordinary or rare they usually notice.”
All I noticed about my aunt’s Morgan Dollar experience is that coin collecting is pretty awesome, and I had a great birthday this year. Thanks, Auntie!
(Oh, this weekend’s Expo also includes stamps, but based on the time I spend in line at the post office, I didn’t dare try to reach them by phone.)
LONG BEACH COIN, STAMP & COLLECTIBLE EXPO LONG BEACH CONVENTION CENTER • 100 S PINE AVE • LONG BEACH 90802 • 562.436.4610 • LONGBEACHEXPO.COM • THURS-FRI 10AM-7PM, SAT 10AM-5PM • $8 ADULTS, $4 SENIORS, CHILDREN 8-16 • THROUGH FEB 13
2 Comments
Hard to believe that Morgan Dollars, last minted in 1921, are still in general circulation. Actually, “general circulation” may be incorrect terminology since all that “poor bastard” (i.e. “fool”) did was exchange his Morgan dollars for face-value paper currency at auntie’s (lucky bitch) bank.
Coincidentally, I cashed-in my unimpressive, mish-mash of a coin collection, including some Morgan dollars, at Liberty Coin about three years ago.
At Liberty Coins you can also get gold bullion. And, also at Liberty Center is Turner’s Outdoorsman where you can get guns to defend the gold you buy at the coin shop, all with one parking space. You can employ the principle of least work while shopping.