THE '76 GOLDWATER DIME - COLLECTING COINS OF ALTERNATE UNIVERSES

Chris Fuccione writes:

When I was just seventeen I moved by myself down to Washington, DC, cause I got a job there in a coin shop. That was my education. I lived in a one room dungeon in a crumby neighborhood, I loved coins that much.

You know, and I do alright. I made my living. I own my own house. I don't live in debt like everybody else does. That's what coins did for me. Coins and specie and spec. I don't care for paper money, it holds nothing for me.

Me, I'm a specialist. I know generalists, I do business with them, I have to. And speculators, sure. You do what you need to do to survive in the world. But me, I'm a specialist and my friends are specialists. I'll give an example, I have a friend, he died. But before he died, his specialty was pay toilet tokens. I mean, have you ever seen a pay toilet? In your life? I saw some once in Europe but I don't even know if they have them there anymore. Anyway, this friend of mine, he spends his life collecting these tokens, these coins, for pay toilets, from around the world and every age. He finds the obscurest pay toilet tokens there are and they're his. And then he dies alone in his apartment with these thousands of toilet tokens around him. I mean, that's the way to go. I mean that. To have these objects of joy around you. To you and me, they are not objects of joy, but to him they are. You know, not everybody gets to have that, it's not something that everyone receives. To have such pleasure from these things, these old things. But he does and I do because, see, we're specialists. Not everybody understands that.

Other people I know, you know, have their special collections. Any thing you can think of, any given thing and there's some guy like me out there obsessed with it. I know people, you meet a lot of interesting people in this business, whose specialties are Depression era wooden nickels or peep show tokens, or misprint coins, error coins, or brockage, that's coins with mirror image stamps on both sides, or obverses or ‘Godless Dollars.' You ever heard of ‘Godless Dollars?' Those are dollar coins where the "In God we trust" part got left off. Now, you see, I respect that. Those are people with specialties. They are connoisseurs, like me. Not any old crap will do.

My specialty? My specialty is the rarest of the rare, okay? I mean, I have collections and I have collections, but my real collection, the only one that's not for sale, that's not in the vault, I'm not even going to tell you where I keep it, guess how many coins I have in my collection. Guess.

I have twelve coins in my collection. That's twelve. I've been doing this for coming up on fifty years and I've amassed twelve coins. In my specialty collection. Now you understand my mind.

I brought them here, I got them in my fireproof, waterproof, idiotproof box, just for you. I brought them to show you because I happen to know you will not shoot me and stab me thirty-six times and run off with my pretty little coins. Besides, I paid more money for the lockbox than I paid for all the coins. So, that's where we are. So allow me to reveal to you, at long last, my specialty.

Okay, this is item number one, this is Exhibit A, okay? I got this in 1981 in my change for a fish sandwich, I kid you not. Don't smudge it. It's mint. It's pristine. It's almost uncirculated, but in another way, it's very, extremely circulated. First, before I give this to you, tell me, who's on the dime?

Very good, FDR's on the dime. Has been since 1946. Now look at this and tell me, who's on that dime?

Yes, he's wearing glasses. FDR wore glasses too but not when posing for coinage. Who is he? No, it's not Truman. Look closer. Recognize him? That's Barry Goldwater. Look, that's him. Yes, I am fully aware that Goldwater was never president. Thank you, Mr. Historian. But that is him and that is a 1976 dime and he's on it. Now you see. Now you see my specialty.

Okay, okay. Let's forget that for now. Let's move to exhibit number two. Take this. Yes, this is a '72 Kennedy half dollar. Yes, that's Kennedy on it. But look at that face, look how wrinkly he is. No, that's not wear, that's not metal fatigue. Metal doesn't wear like that, believe me, I know. That's in the stamp. Which Kennedy is that? That's not John F Kennedy, that's Joseph P Kennedy, his father. Look at it. Sure, he ran for president. An anti-Semite, that's what they said. I'm not going to argue about it now. Give it back. Okay, item three: 1927 penny, Lincoln's supposed to be on it, but who's that guy? Look at that beard. That's John Brown. Number four, 1944 quarter, that guy on it? Eugene V Debs, that commie guy that run for president in 1900. Can you imagine America with a commie president?

Okay, hell with it, look at the rest here:

Huey Long nickel, 1958.

William Randolph Hearst silver dollar, 1969.

Robert E Lee three cent piece from 1888. Don't be stupid, there was no confederate money in 1888.

1965 dime, that's Lindbergh on it.

1992 quarter, you know who that guy is on there? Roy Cohn. Took me forever to figure that one out.

1935 penny, Barnum, the circus guy. That one might actually be a forgery, the zinc plating, it's a little off. Anyway.

1986 nickel, got Herbert Hoover on it. One of the most hated presidents of all time, how'd he get on the nickel?

And lastly, okay, look that this, this is the prize of my collection, 1998 quarter. Who's on it instead of Washington? That's Benedict Arnold. I swear before all that is holy. You know, that son of a bitch was a war hero before he turned traitor.

So that's it. That's my entire collection right there. Nothing else to show. This is my specialty. You see here my life.

To access the podcast, see: EP286 The '76 Goldwater Dime (escapepod.org/2011/03/31/ep284-the-76-goldwater-dime/)

Wayne Homren, Editor

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