Holy Coins
People love putting holes in coins. Some countries designed their coins with holes in the center, France is one of the countries that produced a lot of holed coins for their colonies. But, why did people take coins and put holes in them? In this blog I’ll try to answer that question.
The most common coin that we receive in the shop that has a hole drilled in it is the old Large Cents from the early 1800’s. We’ve had large cents that were used for target practice, we’ve had large cents that had a hole drilled right through the center and we’ve had large cents that had a hole drilled just above Lady Liberty’s head. What does that all mean?
Back before the Civil War the price of the copper washers used in construction
jumped to over one cent each. Many frugal builders realized it would be cheaper
to just take the copper cent coin and use it as a washer. Also, during that
time it was a token of good luck to take a copper coin and nail it to the main
support beam of a structure. We have also seen coins with two holes drilled
close to the center, most likely those were used as buttons. That explains why
someone would drill a hole in the center of the large cent, but why would they
drill a hole above Lady Liberty’s head?
Finally, some coins were just designed to have a hole in them. Whether it’s a call back to the countries heritage or they were looking to save on some metal, each case is different.
Thanks for listening.