1912 American dime

[villa66]

A 1912 dime (10-cent piece) from the United States, struck in .900 silver, 17.9mm wide, and—since 1873—weighing a metric-friendly 2.50 grams.

1912. Barber’s somewhat staid classicism would soon be wiped off American silver by the coming World War and replaced by a more natural (and urgent, perhaps) nationalism, but not just yet. Barber’s Lady Liberty was still holding on.

The dime itself was a very active and useful coin still, in 1912—not least because it was in the process of being discovered to be just the correct size for gapping the spark plugs of Model T Fords.

Barber dimes were mostly retired by the late 1940s, but beginning in 1997, they were given brief (but recurring) moments of cultural currency because of a connection of these coins to the tragic 1912 sinking of the ocean liner RMS Titanic.

According to the movie’s director, James Cameron, in Titanic it is a 1912 dime similar to this one that Rose offers to Jack as payment for his drawing her wearing her necklace—and nothing else.

v.

[Mynter]

It is allways a delight to read your contemplations on coins you are sharing so freely with us. When looking at a US- or canadian dime from the pre- war era, I allways have to think of that after the black friday the amount of ten cents would represent a days pay for hundreds of thousands of workers suddenly being redundant and left to seek for random jobs in order to make ends meet. A canadian whom I studied with many years ago and who was a bit in to coins himself , told me a slogan of those days " Don`t sit on your ass and whine , get your dime as I got mine "

[villa66]

Thanks much for the kind comment. (And the slogan mentioned to you by your Canadian acquaintance--I had not heard it, but it is indeed something I can imagine hearing--thanks too for that.) Anyway, I’ve been a little worried that maybe I’ve been overloading the Forum some, and that I might be making a nuisance of myself. I hope not.

What’s happening is this: on my home-forum we’ve been contributing to a thread on “foreign” coins from 1800-date. Somewhere about the time we got to 1880 I decided I’d pull from my collection a coin of whatever year we were working on and write a few paragraphs about it. I thought that way, by the time we got to 2015 in the thread, I’d have plenty of new entries for my coin-notebook.

Putting some of the new entries here gives me a chance to double-check them before condensing them and entering them in my notebook. So if it isn’t a bother, I’ll keep at it.

Oh, and just a reminder that I’m still digesting all that information you were good enough to share with us about the SMU and related subjects. I have several more questions now that I’m beginning to understand things a little better, and hope that some of the questions will be useful to ask. Soon, maybe.

v.

[KarlAntonMartini]

No bother at all, please continue! Best regards, KarlAntonMartini

[sigistenz]

Yes, villa66, by all means, keep on sharing your wide range of knowledge. I have been enjoying each of your posts - even if I mostly do not know much to add. Looking forward to more and - thank you !
Sigi
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