Re: Coin Collecting

I have to disagree with my friend Paul on coin collecting. It's not a lost hobby, it's still lots of fun.

I own several coin collections, and enjoy updating them and sharing them. The Franklin half dollar is fun to collect and relatively affordable. I inherited an incomplete collection and have been filling it in slowly over the years.

The current Silver Eagle series is also a wonderful issue, beautiful, historical, and readily available.

The State Quarter issues were beautiful and educational as well. I am proud of my complete albums of uncirculated issues from both the Philadelphia and Denver mints. Now on to the National Parks series!

Sure, you're probably not going to pull a super-valuable coin out of circulation. But the truth of the matter is, you were probably as unlikely to do that in years past as you are today. While Paul looks for Wheaties, his parents probably looked for Indian Heads. Now, most of those Indian Heads are worth about a dollar, while the Wheaties are worth about 75 cents. Nobody is getting rich collecting pennies, but we are sure having a lot of fun!

The people collecting super valuable coins were rich in some other venture prior to collecting these coins. For the rest of us, coin collecting offers the same level of enjoyment, albeit centered around less perfect examples of the very same coins. It's the most egalitarian hobby I can imagine!

Sandy Hook, CT

A post from the blog of a high school pal I am proud to call a friend, Stephanie Jones: Here's the link.

This Time, I Won’t Let You Forget …

December 17th 2012

Not one of the Sandy Hook teachers was a “job creator.” Probably none of the Newtown first responders measure their “success” by how much money they manage to earn, sock away and shield from taxes. Yet it was the first responders who ran into, not away from, the gunfire that once again shattered a community, and it was teachers who stood between a madman and other people’s children.

So, when we go back to arguing about who is and isn’t contributing to society, and why and how we should invest our resources, let’s remember Victoria Sota, Dawn Hochsprung, Mary Sherlack, Lauren Rousseau, and the other teachers, police officers, firefighters, and paramedics to whom we entrust our children, our families, our communities, our safety, and our lives.

It is time for politicians to call a halt on the ugly and cynical attacks on public workers. I don’t want to see you wringing your hands at memorial services for the Sandy Hook victims and then, the next day, hear you call their colleagues thugs and leeches. The workers you besmirch and belittle are the same people who protect our beloved ones when we’re not with them and step into the line of fire while we’re running as far as we can in the other direction.

They aren’t job creators. But on Friday morning, we didn’t need job creators. We needed public servants to charge into the bullets, to throw themselves on top of our babies, to keep their cool and soothe our terrified children until other public servants could ensure they were once again safe. And, thank God, they were there.

I’m not going to forget that. And I won’t let you forget that, either.

Coin Collecting

This used to be a serious hobby and one open to everybody. Now with the increase in the number of coins and the systematic way in which coins are distributed, this 20th century hobby is a lost art. I still have the penny and nickel books my grandmother gave me. Though I can't say I have updated them lately. I also still search for old pennies (wheaties) in my change and set them aside. Nothing much of interest in my change these days but old habits die hard. The valuable cons were taken out of general circulation years ago by collectors. And there is no chance the mint is going to make a mistake and create something knew to collect. Heaven knows the original coins they produce now are worth no more than face value, even when they are packaged up nice for potential collectors. I think the loss of coin collecting as a legitimate hobby has contributed to our country's lack of a sense of history. When you go through your old coins and see that they changed to steel during World War 2 it gives you a sense of the collective drama we were enduring during those years. Nothing will give you a clearer idea of what's happening in your country than to look at your money and see that its changing because our nation is at war. This sort of change hasn't occurred since and it is no surprise we haven't been on "All In" on a war since World War 2. Can you imagine people being asked to ration and recycle to support our efforts in Afghanistan? It might have been a good idea instead of paying for our latest wars with off the budget expenditures. Who knows when the bill will come due? Though you can be certain it will come due and sacrifices more extensive than changing the composition of our pennies will be required.