CoralGables-June2018

Shop
A Gold Coin for
Your Thoughts?
OWNING A PIECE OF HISTORY COSTS
LESS THAN YOU THINK
By Doreen Hemlock
Greek coins from 300 years
before Christ. Notes from
Confederate states during U.S.
Civil War days. Money from
pre-Castro Cuba. Step into
Gables Coin & Stamp Shop
on Miracle Mile, and you’ll
find special items like these.
History buff John Albright
started the business 52 years
ago and still enjoys telling the
stories behind the currency.
Consider the bronze and
silver coins from the Roman
Empire. The coins often depict
emperors to highlight their
authority and power, Albright
says. One bronze coin from
316-326 AD shows Emperor
Crispus, a wreath of leaves
around his head. It sells for
a mere $60. Albright’s own
collection features every Roman
emperor, “except the son of one
who was a co-emperor and only
in power for two weeks,” he
says.
Or check out the ancient
coins in gold. Some from the
Byzantine Empire curve like
tiny bowls for easier stacking,
says Albright. One Greek coin
dates back nearly 2,300 years
to 278-276 BC, when King
Pyrrhos ruled Syracuse in Sicily.
That coin shows Athena, the
goddess of reason and the arts.
With 4.3 grams
of gold, it sells
for a slightly
heftier $2,400.
Among
Confederate notes,
I gawked at a pink
$100 note from 1864
that shows Lucy Holcombe
Pickens, wife of the South
Carolina governor. She’s the
only contemporary woman
ever pictured on a Confederate
note. That envelope-sized bill
retails for $95.
Confederate notes
of smaller denominations
are tougher to find,
Albright says. “People
saved the 50s and 100s
thinking they might be
valuable one day. But
they used the ones and
twos to line the inside of
their log cabins, because
paper then was scarce.”
Cuba aficionados
can see the strength of
U.S. ties in the Cuban
coins minted in Philadelphia
from the earlyto-mid-1900s,
adds
Albright. One silver peso
from 1953 marks 100 years
since the birth of Cuban independence
leader Jose Marti
and sells for $35.
Above: John Albright, owner
Gables Coin & Stamp.
Left: A silver peso with the image of
Jose Martí; a 2,300 year old Greek
coin showing the Goddess Athena.
Below: A $100 Confederate note
depicting the wife of the governor
of South Carolina.
20 thecoralgablesmagazine.com Photography by Lizzie Wilcox