Personal coinages?

[villa66]

Our mutual interest in coins sometime takes odd forms. Surely there are many others who have struck their own coinage? My own is a very crude affair, and here from my “special collection” are probably the only two survivors of my “Roman” coinage.

Certainly they’re the only two survivors I own of the 15-20 (uniface) pieces that I struck as a kid in Italia in 1967 using a hammer, a screwdriver and a nail. The metal used is lead, and I spray-painted about 5-7 each in copper, silver, and gold. The “denomination” is visible at center: in copper it was simply “I”, in silver “I-dot,” and in gold “I-dot-dot.”

We were studying Roman history in school at the time, so “T” for Tiberius is visible at upper-right.

Almost all of the 15-20 “mintage” were eventually lost or destroyed in various games of make-believe, but at least one of them was traded to an adult collector up the street. So maybe one or two others still survive, but almost certainly not.

And then there are my “Oriental” patterns from the next year, 1968. (Kids!)

Any other personal coinages?

v.

[sigistenz]

My personal coinage was virtual. On the picture of a coin I copied a non existing date and published it as true at a coin forum
The reactions were interesting.
Sigi
-

[Rezo]

hehe, i recently started my own collection of self-struck coins. I'm using bronze or copper blanks a local metal trader delivered. With an engraver, some training and a lot of time some coins were minted. One shows a cross, another shows a cross and some kind of inscription. One is round, the other is quadrangular. okay, lets be creative!

best
Rezo

[villa66]

Thanks much for the individual experiences--I really enjoy reading them.

I'll leave this be for a week before I add my 1968 patterns (yikes!). Maybe some more folks have similar memories?

v.

[villa66]

Summertime 1968, school was out and summer vacation had arrived with its acres and acres of free time. One week that summer I experimented with a new “coinage,” apparently not long after I had learned Oriental numbers so I could date my Japanese coins. My 1968 “patterns:”

At left below is the c.15mm “5” denomination, with the c.18mm “10” at right below (I still have the “20” but corrosion has overtaken it. ) I used a much thicker planchet than with the “Roman coins” the year before, which enabled a two-sided design. They’re of lead again, and would have been painted, but never were.

And of course kids are kids, so I won’t be too embarrassed at reciting the design details. The Oriental “1” beneath the obverse sunrise is a date done dynastic style, and here stands for 1968. The large Oriental “5” and “10” occupy the center of the two reverses. My initials are there, and the “S,” well, collectors of American coins will recognize San Francisco’s mintmark, which was a mini-obsession within the hobby when I first met coins.

The San Francisco mint had closed in 1955, but had reopened in the mid-‘60s as a result of the coin shortage. Because of the coin shortage, however, all mintmarks had been removed from American coins beginning in 1965 in an attempt to reduce collector demand. Mintmarks—and especially San Francisco’s “S”—returned to U.S. coinage in 1968. And not coincidentally, made its first appearance that year on my own “coins.”

But these 1968 patterns would be my last adventure in coining. I had exhausted my metal supply (the lead fishing sinkers in Dad’s toolbox).
v.