Month: May 2020

Tips for a successful garage sale

On By wisdomlaneantiquesIn Garage SalesLeave a comment

I see them everywhere, especially during the spring and early summer months.  Garage sales are fun to go to, but how do you have a successful one of your own?

One thing that helps is to put out a lot of signs where you are most likely to snag the most traffic.  The signs must be visible from the street, and even give the address of your sale.  It even helps to give the time and dates of your sale.

The next thing you need to do is to make your merchandise accessible.  The items that are not in the sale need to be either covered with a sheet or tucked away somewhere else if possible.  Dust or clean the things going into the sale.  A clean, well-organized sale does so much better.

Do not overprice your items.  We have all gone to sales where the garage sale prices were higher than the original sticker price—and we have left shaking our heads in disbelief.

For your own safety, do not allow strangers to enter your home to use the bathroom or the phone.  They just might be casing your house to see what you have for the possibility of a robbery.

Be willing to entertain a good offer (not 50 cents for a 50-dollar item).  If the offer is a little low, you can always give a counteroffer.

Be friendly with the people that come by—but do not sit and stare at your customers.  In a way, they are your guests.  But at the same time, do not allow bad manners (it’s your sale after all). If you are willing to do this, your garage sale will be a hit. You might even just sell out of everything!

There was a Seated Liberty design on United States coins?

On By wisdomlaneantiquesIn MoneyLeave a comment

This was an actual design that the United States mint produced from 1836 through 1891.  The design was produced at the main mint in Philadelphia, as well as the branch mints in San Francisco, Carson City, and even New Orleans.

This design was put on the half dime (which later became the 5-cent piece), dime, quarter, twenty cent piece, half dollar, and even the dollar.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com

Because there were so many years and denominations, this gives you a massive assortment of coins to choose from to form a collection.  Each denomination has its rare examples (it could be a rare year, mint mark or die variety), so it might take some hunting and some saving on your part to find them.

The design itself even gives you another way to collect them.  In 1853 and 1873, weights of the each of the denominations were changed by the U.S. mint.  When they did this, they added arrows around the date.  These arrows were then removed in 1856 and 1875, so you could collect either or both styles.  A lot of the times, you will see the coin being described as “with arrows” or “without arrows”.

You can see that the coin pictured above is the “without arrows” variety around the date.

This design also has some stars near the edge (this is on the same side that Miss Liberty is on).  These stars were then replaced with rays around Miss Liberty in 1860.  Like with the arrows, you will sometimes see these coins described as “with rays” or “without rays”.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com

The “with rays” variety can be seen on the photo above on the eagle side.

“Buy the book before the coin” is a famous saying to keep in mind when you are about to embark on collecting this design.

Have you run across this design either at a flea market, antique mall, a show, or even a coin shop?

Two Cents worth? Yep

On By wisdomlaneantiquesIn Beginning to collect, Money, Shopping tips, Tips for the beginner, Vintage, Vintage, Vintage!Leave a comment

Did you know that there was actually a 2-cent coin that was produced by the United States mint?

The Two Cent piece officially ran from 1864 to 1872, but there was a copy made for collectors in 1873.

photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com

The economic turmoil of the American Civil War caused any and all government-issued coins to vanish from circulation (they were hoarded by the public) Even the Indian Head cent—which was made of bronze—was pretty much gone from circulation (The Coinage Act Of 1864 authorized the cent to switch to a bronze composition and the production of the Two Cent coin).

Even though there were other mints actively producing coins at the time, this coin was only produced at the mint based in Philadelphia.  What this means is that there will not be a mint mark anywhere (which is the way this mint was marking the coins until 1980).

Two of the more famous die varieties happened in 1864.  One is called the “large motto,” and the other is called the “small motto.”  These two varieties deal with the motto, “In God We Trust.”  The words IN, GOD, and TRUST has some small differences, while the word WE has the most differences.  It all hinges on the size of it, and it is very noticeable.  The WE on “large motto” is larger than the WE on the “small motto.”

Large motto photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com
small motto photo courtesy of Wikipedia.com

The “small motto” is much scarcer than the “large motto.”  The best idea is to keep an eye out for it in case you might walk across a case full of coins at a mall, or happen to be at a coin shop or show.

Have you seen one of these really cool coins?