Sometimes an event or encounter with another personcan have a significant impact onone's career path. This is thestory of how a coin purchase altered the direction of my life.

As a young boy growing up inPittsburgh, I was bitten by the collecting bug early in life. In additionto coins, I collected stamps, comicbooks, baseball cards and toy soldiers. I began acquiring coins whenI was about 10 years old. Like manybeginning collectors in this era, Istarted filling holes in Whitman folders with Lincoln cents my parents received in change. Later, myfather brought home a few rolls ofcents from the bank each week so Icould look for dates I was missing.I also expanded my collection toinclude other denominations-nickels, dimes, quarters, halfdollars and silver dollars.

I found it difficult to locatecertain dates (and mintmarks) inchange, so I started visiting localcoin shops. After buying a copy ofA Guide Book of United States Coins(the ) and learning howscarce and valuable many of thekey dates were in each denomination, I started saving my allowanceto purchase some of these coins.My interest in early U.S. coins wassparked in 1957 when I purchasedseveral half cents, including the1797 and 1804 varieties from AddisonSmith-a Pittsburgh dealer.

The Acquisition
Since local dealers did not havemany early coppers in stock, Istarted acquiring more pieces fromauctions. One that caught my attention was the June 1970 Stack'sJames C. Rawls sale, which had anumber of mid-grade half cents andlarge cents that I needed for mycollection. I was a successful mailbidder on six lots, including an 1808/7 Gilbert-1 half cent (Lot1123) for $100, graded Fine to VeryFine. I did not know the significance of this coin until I met RogerCohen at the ANA's 1973 BostonConvention and purchased a copyof his reference American Half Cents(1971).

I learned from the book thatmy 1808/7 half cent was the finest-known of the extremely rareCohen-1 die variety-a Rarity-8with only 1-3 examples known atthe time. Since this die varietywas not discovered by Cohen until1962, it was not listed in EbenezerGilbert's The United States HalfCents (1916), which had been thestandard reference on the seriesuntil Cohen's work was published.