Professional ways to store collections.

[Paddy]

I think it depends a bit on your mindset. I get more pleasure out of filling a gap in a difficult date run with a reasonable example than I do from picking up a common coin in Unc. 

10 hours ago, Peckris 2 said:

Do remember this: it's far better to have one UNC coin of a particular type, than a date run in F (for example). Just saying...

 

[Coins Of the UK and US]

Thanks everyone for the advice.

[Rob]

1 hour ago, Paddy said:

I think it depends a bit on your mindset. I get more pleasure out of filling a gap in a difficult date run with a reasonable example than I do from picking up a common coin in Unc. 

 

We all have dogs in our collections. I remember when I was cataloguing Stewartby's collection for Spink. I was under pressure to keep the lot numbers down as far as possible because of the quantities involved. That raised a problem when I was trying to catalogue the Edward IV halfpennies as he had one excessively rare light coinage Canterbury coin with mm. Pall and trefoils at the neck (S2072A). The problem was the fact it was unique. The downside was unique or not, it was a dog. To keep the average lot value up, I decided to mix it with a high grade halfpenny and gave it a buy me estimate. As I suspected, the high grade piece did all the heavy lifting on the lot, but I already had one, so pulled out the stops and bought the pair. Having bought it, I immediately sold the better coin for nearly as much as the lot of 2 cost, leaving me with a cracked, bent, holed, worn, and just about every other fault imaginable coin that cost me about £9. Still never seen another. The coin in question was found in Hampshire near to the Delme-Radcliffe home, who acquired it when found, wrote it up in the BNJ vol.51 and sold it in her sale in 1985 (lot 288). An absolute dog, and one of the last things I would part with. I used it to tick the pall marked coin box.

Here it is in all its splendour (?)

[Coins Of the UK and US]

Thanks for sharing. That’s a lovely piece.

[Peckris 2]

On 1/3/2026 at 8:46 AM, Paddy said:

I think it depends a bit on your mindset. I get more pleasure out of filling a gap in a difficult date run with a reasonable example than I do from picking up a common coin in Unc. 

Type collections don't just contain common coins!! (I speak from experience..). Also, I do have date runs for a few favourite series, e.g. George V halfcrowns 1927-1936, and bronze pennies 1895-1967, though I don't lose any sleep at all over the odd gap such as 1914 in UNC, but I would love a high grade 1946 ONE' penny so I do take your point about filling gaps. But as I say, I really don't lose sleep over most gaps I have.