WHEN I WAS A YOUNG COLLECTOR in the 1950s, my main coin of interest was the Lincoln cent. This was followed closely by Jefferson and Buffalo nickels. You can easily see their appeal to a young, not too enterprising kid: They didn’t cost much to collect.
In Jefferson nickels, the low-mintage 1950-D had recently made its appearance, and stories abound of how people acquired and saved vast quantities of uncirculated rolls. In just a few years, the price of these rolls, which was about $40 ($1 apiece) at the time I started following them in a coin newspaper, would begin its ascent.
Before that happened, I managed to convince my father that we really needed a roll of these “rare” nickels, he wrote a check, and I mailed it to…
