Some Numismatist Jokes

(Adapted from Curt Wood’s “Viewpoint” article in the October 5th, 2010 Numismatic News). 

You stubbornly call your wife named Penny, Cent, saying that the US coin has always been a cent, never a penny.

While vacationing in Wyoming, you see a huge herd of buffalo, but the only one you notice is the one that has a full horn, and three legs.

You are seeing the sights in Philadelphia, and while admiring the Liberty Bell, you note that the real one doesn’t have full bell lines.

You are attracted to your future wife because when you first met her, she had the face of a goddess, was wearing a Liberty cap, and had cute little wings on the side of her head.

The car of your dreams is a 1909 Lincoln, with the front plate reading “S” and the rear plate “VDB”.

You are at a pizzeria, and you tell the guy behind the counter to only handle your pizza by the edge, and to add a little more topping to the obverse.

You saw Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction” on TV, and it immediately reminded you of the Liberty on the Type One “bare breasted” version of the Standing Liberty Quarter.

You turn your uncle into both a numismatist and a teetotaler by telling him he needed “more Proof 70 and less 70 Proof”.

You doggie bag one of your breakfast waffles from your favorite restaurant after noting that the checkerboard pattern shows unmistakable signs of a doubled die error.

Then …  you decide to have the waffle professionally slabbed and graded – and have the famous auction houses of New York and London fight over who gets to make history selling it.

Then … since you found out the waffle iron was a rare doubled die, you negotiate a deal with the restaurant to buy it.

You can’t watch the old classic movie “A Streetcar Named Desire” without thinking of the 1879 and 1880 US $4 Gold coin when Marlon Brando screams “Stella”.

You show off by flipping a manhole cover instead of a coin to decide something. But not really, you are just showing off.

But your wife is if she admires the lovely rainbow toning on the rim of the manhole cover, the spectacular red and turquoise toning on the reverse, and the strong strike of the “Newark” mintmark.

You insist on spelling dime as “Disme”. So you go to a nightclub to have a good “tisme”, insist that the Charades floor show is billed as “misme”, and take your Perrier with a little twist of “lisme”.

* If you are done laughing, read the real history of “disme” below. 

But you aren’t a numismatist if you are asked to define “Mint State” and your answer is “Wisconsin”.   

However you are if you answer “Pennsylvania”, “Colorado” or “California” (the three actual “mint states” of Philadelphia, Denver and San Francisco).

And a really knowledgeable one if you answer “Louisiana”, “Nevada”, “Georgia” or “North Carolina” (the mints that were at New Orleans, Carson City, Dahlonega and Charlotte).

And a numisma-genius if you can answer “New York” – the state of our newest mint, West Point.

* Spelling the word dime as “disme” only shows you to be a snobbish collector of only one very early US coin. Only the 1792 half disme spells it this way. (But all other U.S. 5 or 10 cent coins spell it “dime”.) This is an Old English (and Old French) spelling, taken from the Latin phrase : Hemi-decima-pars, which translates to “half of the tenth part”. The “S” in the spelling “disme” is silent, and was quickly dropped in later usage. Our word “decimal” comes from the same root, and does keep the “S” sound.