National Coin Week: Winning Entry
Coins have long formed a common language of commerce. Since the dawn of international trade, Austrian Thalers, Spanish Pieces of Eight, and other Trade Dollars sealed deals between merchants, often thousand miles from where the currencies were minted. Nowadays, coins connect collectors; forming the lens through which many of us learn about obscure rulers, economic theories, and corners of the world we would have trouble even finding on a map. Coins continue to bring people together.At any given numismatic club meeting, you might find ancient Greek coins next to the latest novelty pieces freshly minted for Niue. Likewise, you'll find people from all walks of life. In my club – the Dallas Coin Club - you'll find retired engineers rubbing elbows with office temps, hunters and gun-control advocates united in their political opinions about ancient controversies (ie; Free Silver coinage or the use of reeding to stop counterfeiting), and members whose genealogy traces to all corners of the world sharing a plate of beef fajita nachos. Numismatics is the common thread tying us all together. While we may not be able to agree on Chardonnay or Sweet Tea with dinner, our common passion drives us to admire the same R-5 token, MS65PL medal, or large sized note with a PPQ designation. Through show-and-tell and educational programs, we learn about items that may not be in our personal collections... yet. Sometimes, another member's enthusiasm for two cent pieces, or error coins, or the 1936 US Philippine commemoratives can spark a lifelong interest.Numismatics is about more than just gaining personal knowledge. It's about accumulating and sharing the stories that bring coins to life. It's about teaching how to protect the tiny pieces of art that pass through our hands for future generations. It's about gaming out winning bidding strategies, passing along metal detecting skills, and identifying new die varieties for others to check in their collection. In these and any of a dozen other applications, numismatic knowledge becomes more than the sum of its parts when it brings collectors together.
