By Maribeth Keane and Ben Marks — Like everybody else, I started collecting coins when I was probably around 10 years old—going to the bank, buying a roll of Lincoln cents, and trying to fill those Whitman folders. My focus was on Lincoln cents from 1909 through 1966. Then I moved up to Jefferson nickels, and I tried to find Buffalo nickels still in circulation coupled with some occasional pre-1965 silver. I grew up in a relatively small town in Maine, and our family was definitely not middle class. My father had to...

U.S. Pattern Coins Tell the Stories Behind Our Currency

By Maribeth Keane and Jessica Lewis — I started collecting coins when I was five years old, and I started dealing when I was 13 or 14. Most kids start with coins of circulation—I had albums for Jefferson nickels, Lincoln pennies and Roosevelt dimes. I started with Morgan and Peace dollars pretty early. I came close to finishing a set of Peace dollars, I was one coin away. That’s the closest I ever got to completing a collection of anything in my life. But I quickly moved into all kinds of other coins from around the world. I...