Two new (to me) books

This has been an odd year for me. Mostly in ways that I can't even put into words. If I wanted to be overly dramatic I'd say that it's been transformative, but that's a fit too flowery for me, so I'll just stick with 'odd'.

Old interests have been falling by the wayside, new interests have emerged to take the place of the old, and a couple of long dormant interests have risen from the ashes to become new once again. 

Most of this change is due in large part to my ongoing genealogical research (I can hear the collective groan now). Though, some of it has also been influenced by what I'd describe as my year-long (so far) attempt at self-improvement. I don't think I've talked about the latter on here yet, and since it'll probably be long-winded when I do, I'll save it for another day. In the meantime, I will say that I sort of feel like, that after "39" years, I've finally found the path that I'm supposed to be on (that sounds pretty dramatic too - sorry!).

One area that's been changing very quickly is in the kind of books that I've been seeking out. A small example of this can be seen in the two books I got at the Book Cellar last week...

We moved to Gresham (OR) when I was 12, and not too long after that I started to develop an interest in coin collecting. I can no longer recall what brought on this new interest, but I do remember being all in from the get-go. This was aided greatly by finding out (via the phone book) that there was a wonderful little shop, Oregon Trail Coin & Stamp, located about two miles from our house (duplex). A lot of my memories from this era are gone, but I can still remember exactly what this place looked like. The left side of the store was dedicated to coins, and the right, stamps. And though it would probably be considered unpleasant to the modern nose, the shop smelt of all things old, which I say in the sincerest form possible. It was a delightful smell, and one that I was already quite accustomed to. You can still find that smell in certain places, but it's not nearly as common as it used to be.

The shop was run by husband and wife duo, and while the guy had a bit of a reputation for being a curmudgeon, he was always nice to me. Of course, I never saw any other kids in there, so maybe he was just forcing himself to be pleasant so that he wouldn't scare off a future caretaker of his preferred hobby. But either way, I never had a problem with him.

The first two or three times I went there, my mom drove me, but every time after that I rode my bike. I don't what the peak hours were for the shop, but I can remember being in there many a summer afternoon, and I was the only customer there. My two primary hobbies at this time were sports cards and coin, and between the two I did not have a lot of money to spend. This was never a deterrent though, as I can remember riding there with all of a dollar (or less) in my pocket on more than a few occasions. Though, in retrospect, this wasn't quite as bad as it seemed, because unbeknownst to me, silver was dipping to an all-time low around this time (I wanna say that was in '95); so my dollar went a lot further towards trying to complete a run of Mercury dimes, which were my favorites at that time. That's another reason too why I have such fond memories of that guy there (whose name I cannot for the life of me remember!), I could, and would, spend an hour or two going through all of the trays of "junk silver", any and all of the Whitman folders, and even some of the binders of pricier things - getting a history lesson all the while - end up spending a dollar or two, and never see any signs of frustration from either of the couple at my taking up so much of there time and then spending so little. 

Like most kids, my interests started to change once the teenage years began. My trips to the store became a lot less frequent, and I think they ended up closing the shop around 1999 or 2000. I still saw them once a year for a few years after that, as they would have a couple of tables at the yearly antique and collectibles show that was held out at the Expo Center. My interest in coins was almost non-existent by that point, but I usually bought a couple of things from them there, mostly just for old-times sake. I don't remember ever seeing them again after about 2005, and I could swear that someone mentioned that the guy had been diagnosed with alzheimer's; which of course would explain why they stopped setting up at the show.

I never did start to actively collect coins again, but unlike a lot of other things, I never sold my collection, and have thought off and on about trying to pick it up again, if only to complete that run of Mercury dimes that I never finished (I probably could've finished way back when, but I was always being sidetracked by other shiny/silver objects). Recently though, I've also started to develop an interest in all things related to colonial coinage; this being a direct result of finding out that certain branches of my family have been here (in the U.S.) for much longer than I would've ever imagined. It just seemed like a good way to try and connect a little more with some of those folks.

Given how extensive the subject matter is, and me being the sort that prefers to read things in printed form, I knew that I'd have to try to find a book, preferably of the cheaper variety, to give me some sense of what was what, and something that I could go back and use for reference when needed as well.

 

There a couple of highly rated $30+ books on colonial coins on Amazon, but I'm not gonna be spending that much on something that I can't flip through before purchasing, and since they appear to be the kind of books that are near impossible to find in the wild, I knew I'd have to look for something else, and I did... in the form of this $1 Whitman guide from 1974 (which also still has the original $2.50 price on the cover).

Obviously the prices are a bit outdated, but since I wasn't buying it for that, it didn't matter. This ended up being exactly what I was looking for, heck, the introduction alone, which is an overview (and then some) of the history of coinage in the United States, was well worth the dollar. I had no idea that pretty much any and all foreign coins were accepted for goods here during the colonial days.

It looks like I'm a bit late to start thinking about acquiring anything from this era though, as from what I've read on a couple of message boards, it seems that, like just about everything else, colonial coins have jumped up considerably in price since the rona got going. And after comparing quite a few of the mostly cheaper (at the time) things in this book against the current going rate on eBay, well, I think I'm just gonna have to be content to learn about the coins; because aside from one particular coin, everything else is way out of my range.

I've always been interested in history, but for the most part that interest has been focused on much further back than colonial (and post colonial) America. But again, thanks to all of my genealogical findings, that interest, or lack thereof, has been changing. I had a pretty good working knowledge of all things Ben Franklin going into this book; but even so, I still learned quite a bit from reading this book (I paused the Shipwrecks book to get to this one sooner), and also now have a bunch of other books written down that'll need to be looked for. If I were the sort who was capable of writing a book review, I'd be very inclined to do so for this one, but alas, that's beyond my abilities -- so in lieu of that, I will just say that this was an immensely enjoyable book, and one that I would highly recommend to anyone who's interested in this era of American history, or it's personalities.

I don't know if all of the copies were printed this way, but as an extra added bonus, mine was of the deckle edge variety; which is something that I absolutely adore. In fact, if I were in charge, all books would have deckled pages. World peace be damned, I want more deckling!

I'm sure that the topics on here will continue to evolve (as I do?), probably becoming even more me-centric, which may not be everyone's cup of tea, so even though I don't mind posting for myself; just know that I do appreciate the few of you that do continue to come around here.

I was surprised to be able to get out and go somewhere else other than the Book Cellar last week as well. I failed miserably at what I went to this other place to try and do, but I did get a lot of pictures while there, so next week's post is gonna be VERY heavy on the pictures.