h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

For a lot of years, my Dad was pleased to receive common pocket coins from exchange students (and kids of his) from here and there. He expired early 2011, and recently his wife passed along some of these coins.

A few were in a packet simply labelled Australia, though obviously they are not all of your continent. I wondered if you could suggest how common or not-so-much they might be? They are as follows (by physical size):

Australia 1970, 'Fifty-cents', large'ish and flat-edged

New Zealand 1965, One-Florin

Australia 1959, Half penny

'Advance Australia', 1951 sixpence

Australia 1941 three pence

Again, pocket-grade and obviously well circulated, a few downright grungey. Still, they seem a bit novel to me. Wondered if any might still be unusual around your domains.

From the top:

The 50 cent piece is still in circulation. If it's one of the commemorative ones (Bicentenary of Captain Cook's visit - map and Cook and things on it) there's a slight premium, but I got one in change the other day.

The NZ florin - that's a two shilling piece, which was decimalised as 20 cents. Not sure when NZ went decimal, it might have been 1967 - I suggest asking one of the NZ hootoo people for more information.

The others: no, nothing special, but the 1951 sixpence is a commemorative piece - 50 Years of Federation. The 3d and 6d pieces are actual silver, and they might be worth their value as metal.

Hope this helps...

Ivan.

Ah, so that who the chap is with the map. Nice.

Thanks for the info and comments, I will make notations. I expect I will clean up and sort this several pounds of coins, make notes as I can find out what they are, and 'book' them. Dad enjoyed them and it is the only thing of his that I now have ...

Cheers

I remember those NZ florins being around a bit when I was a kid, but strangely I don't remember using the word 'florin'.

I'd guess they're not that rare collector wise but still interesting.

Thanks for the reply ...

I haven't studied the small load of coins, but have sorted them by nationality. As few as one (Oman, Czech and India)
and as many as 15 or so (Italy and Portugal), and find 20 'countries' in all. Some apparently do have some trade value
so far, but hardly worth serious efforts while living in this small town. So they will make an 'interesting' collection of
things to pass along if a grand-child develops an interest.

The 'Oman' one, a bit of aluminium, took the longest to determine it's source. Some flavour of Arabic scrip around the outer
ring on one side, a large stylised "O" that may have been an eye, and the other side bearing only "1970 - 1973"

Something different as a project as winter approaches.

Cheers