...of Lileks. On coins:

I upended the bag on the kitchen table, and whistled: wow. Junk. The dimes, for example, might fetch 10.001 cents today. I found many 1945 Mercury Dimes – surely they must be worth something! They’re old! Of course, 200 million were struck, so they’re not exactly in the hen’s-teeth category. I separated the Buffalo Nickels and Mercury Dimes and velvet-smooth quarters, marvelling at the smoothness of the faces and edges. It took decades and numberless hands to accomplish this amount of erosion, and all that effort only served to lessen the value.

At least they survived. What happens to old coins? Destroyed or lost or hoarded, I guess. It’s a big country. The government struck 200 million Mercury dimes in 1945 alone, and I imagine they could be misplaced or hidden quite easily. My bag had 200. Condition? VL, which is a coin-collector term for “very lousy.” Even so, they have mysteries. In fact they have more mysteries than a perfect coin that shines like the day it was minted. Uncirculated coins never knew the jostle of the pocket, the community of the bureau tray, the sudden terror of the hand dipping into the cash drawer, the nose-to-nape comfort of the womb-like roll. They have not lived! They are but princes born in luxury, entombed in gilded vaults! These, my friends, are coins that saw action:

I read that this morning. It's on my list of things to read with my morning coffee. I enjoyed this treatise on coinage. :^)

An uncirculated coin is piece of art. A well-used coin is a piece of history.

Numismatics aside, the dimes and quarters minted up to 1964 are 90% silver and worth several times there face value. If Tom has a big sack of them, he might have some serious fun money.

At least the old silver coins are worth something at metal - well over face value.

Last I bought them, silver was at about $5 an ounce, and the coins were worth about four times face value.

With today's prices, that's about ten times face, for a dollar or so each.