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Pile of Kittens
Apr 23, 2005

Why does everything STILL smell like pussy?

While visiting family in Argentina a while back, I ran into an old family friend. He was selling his house in part due to an economic recession that was making it untenable for a man with grown children to keep a three-bedroom house in the middle of the city. I caught him as he was just finishing up moving out, and he had some odds and ends he offloaded on me, including some antique teacups his mother hand-painted (one of which adorably has a tiny heart on its bottom). He also gave me a mason jar of mostly South American currency from his travels when he was younger. As souvenirs, he would find a coin or two or some bills from the country that was minted in the year he traveled to it. He did most of this traveling in the late 60s through the 80s, so I have an interesting snapshot of the Latin American debt crisis (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_American_debt_crisis) of that period. He also saved some older Argentinian money.

First, the bills, which aren't in great shape, and which don't appear to have dates on them.



Top row is two Argentinian 100 peso ley notes. The art on the back is of Ushuaia, which narrows the date down to 1971 to 1984.

Middle row left is an Argentinian 10,000 australes note. The portrait of Carlos Pellegrini, with a truly bitchin moustache, identifies the vintage as 1989 to 1992. The austral was implemented at a rate of 1 austral for 1000 of the old peso, which due to the debt crisis had become hilariously devalued.

Middle row right is a battered 1000 new peso note from Uruguay. Nothing says "this currency will totally work better" like calling it the "new" peso. Apparently Uruguay liked to add these adjectives to their money to distinguish it from the prior currency and at one point went to the "peso fuerte" which means "strong peso". That didn't work out for them. Anyway, this one is from before 1983 as it has a portrait of Artigas, but after 1978 as that's when they started printing these larger denominations as their economy faltered with the rest of the continent.

Bottom row left is an Argentinian 1000 peso ley note, printed some time between 1973 and 1984.

Bottom right is a Brazilian 1000 cruzados note. Brazil only kept the cruzados between 1986 and 1989, part of a rapid series of 1:1000 currency shifts in an attempt to curb the massive devaluing of the currency at the time. As their economy is largely agriculture and mining, they had borrowed a particularly large amount to try and diversify their economy to also start producing oil and maybe have some industry. They are the twelfth largest oil exporter in the world, and yet still as of 2014 they had the most foreign debt in South America. Bummer.



Top left is a modern 5 peso note from Argentina. I included it because I love the slightly confused slightly sarcastic expression on Jose de San Martin's face. He's like the George Washington of Argentina and he's throwing real shade.

Top right is a one Canadian dollar note from the "Scenes of Canada" series, which places it any time between 1973 to 1989. I like the pretty colors, and also Queen Elizabeth II was super cute when she was younger :3:

Bottom left is an Argentinian 500 peso note with a somewhat older Jose de San Martin, looking old and jaded. It's also from the peso ley period, putting it between 1972 and 1984.

Bottom right is my favorite because of its odd dimensions. Something about squarer money just screams old-timey to me. It could have been printed as early as 1954, but considering what good shape it's in (it's still quite crisp) it's probably pretty modern. This series of notes was in circulation until the euro.

Now for the coins! There's a ton more coins but they're mostly multiples from different years. One really cool thing I like about these coins is that some of them are stainless steel, and some of them are honest to god aluminum. They feel like freaking monopoly money when you hold them. If I'm not sick of researching coins by the end of this post, I might just pull out all the Argentinian money and line it up by year so that you can see the descent into madness and debt over the years.



Okay, let's start at 12 and proceed clockwise. That big one with QE2 is a 50 cent Australian coin. On the back is the Australian coat of arms being supported by a kangaroo and an emu, which is pretty hilarious to me. It's dated 1984.

Next is a Japanese 50 yen coin. I love the chrysanthemum design on the back! This coin has been issued since 1967 and so it's not remotely rare, I just like it.

Then there's a cluster of three Israeli coins. I like the notched edge of the medium size one. They are from the old Israeli pound series, which were used from 1967 to 1980. The largest one is a 1 lira, the medium a 1 agorah, and the small a 5 agorah.

At about 3 o'clock we have a 10 groschen coin from Austria, dated 1963, made of aluminum.

Following that, a 10 lira and 5 lira coin from Italy, dated 1955 and 1951 respectively. These coins were only produced starting 1951 so apparently they would be worth something if they were in better condition. They're quite grody though.

The next coin is a 2 franc coin from Switzerland and is from 1968, which is the year they stopped printing them in pure silver. Dang.

I quite like the next two coins, which are both 1 sol "de oro" coins from Peru. I'm using sarcasm quotes here because there's no gold in these, they're brass. I like how they've patinated over the years, though. One is from 1966 and one is from 1958. The 1966 one has a cute picture of a llama on the back. I guess Peru doesn't have much else going for it to put on their coins.

Continuing on, a 10 peso coin from Chile from 1973, then a 300 reais coin from Brazil in 1935! It's the oldest coin in the collection and is also sadly worthless.

Then, a 1 sucre and 20 centavo coin from Ecuador from the mid-sixties, and we're almost done because now it's just a bunch of Argentinian coins.

The Argentinian coins are interesting enough that I think I'm going to go ahead and hit submit here and then do that chronological lineup.

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Pile of Kittens
Apr 23, 2005

Why does everything STILL smell like pussy?

Okay! Here are all the Argentinian coins, minus the duplicates. I have a good handful of the tiny little 1 centavo aluminum coins. They are unbelievably cute, less than a centimeter in diameter :3:



Alright, first row goes from 1944 (!!) through 1974. Coins are made of the usual nickel-silver or brass-ish up until 1970, when they started with the adorable funny money for single centavos, but the 10, 20, and 50 centavo coins are still alloy. Second row is all alloy coins from 1974 to 1981, but there's a couple interesting things. One is the 1978 coin which is a 20 peso commemorative minting for Argentina hosting the world cup! And then in 1979 suddenly we're going from 5 and 10 peso coins to 100 peso coins :stare:. That's when currency really started to get devalued.

Fourth row is 1983 to 1992. The aluminum coins are back, but this time it's not limited to the 1 centavo coins, but all denominations shown from 1982 to 1984 are struck in aluminum, even the 1 peso coins. Then in 1985 a return to alloy and smaller denominations. Then, in 1989, Argentina converted to the austral and poo poo hit the fan. I have aluminum 1, 5, 100, 500, and incredibly a 1000 australes coin from 1989 to 1991. To their left are smaller change from the austral period, which oddly were struck in alloy. I'm not sure why you would cast the small coins in alloy and then aluminum for the larger values? Anyway, from 1985 to 1991 the value of the austral went from 0.855 per dollar (more valuable than the dollar, wow) to a peak of 10,028 per dollar (slightly less than 1/10th of a cent) near the end of that currency.

Then the last row, which spans 1992 to 2009, which I think is when I got this collection from the prior owner. Interestingly they went to a nickel alloy for the 25 centavo piece briefly in the mid-nineties but went back to the brass-type alloy for it.

Also, I found one coin that might be worth a few bucks! Woohoo! It's a half-franc from 1920, back when they were actual silver. I also have an East German 10 pfennig coin, which is worthless but pretty cool imo.

MrYenko
Jun 18, 2012

#2 isn't ALWAYS bad...

So, I just bought a house, and along with some abandoned paperwork, I found a belt buckle. A belt buckle with this set into it. Did I find a real silver dollar, or is this an imitation? Is it worth anything past melt value if it's real? The obverse has some blue and purple hues to it that don't show up well in photos. The reverse is pretty much as represented here.

I haven't touched it, in terms of cleaning or refinishing. This is as I found it.







fredor
Apr 10, 2007

MrYenko posted:

I haven't touched it, in terms of cleaning or refinishing. This is as I found it.

Unfortunately, it basically has been "cleaned" by having clothing rub against it a lot. It's worth $15-$20.

Nosre
Apr 16, 2002


This thread maybe familiar with stamps, too? Not sure if I should start a new thread, this is a pretty huge project.

I've taken on figuring out initial estimates for my great uncle's stamp collection, which he assembled mostly in the 60s and 70s. He died in 1980 and it's been sitting in a bookshelf since shortly thereafter. It's 26 full binders organized by picture subject, of stamps from all over the world. Mostly unused, but some are imprinted.

Getting a complete valuation is clearly going to need a professional or months of work, but I'm looking for some guidelines to get me started. For all I know, the 60s and 70s of stamps were the early 90s of baseball cards, and it's all cheap; or there could be gems hidden all over the place.

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