Another story of a lucky man found a coins collection in his new house. Fred Murray from Winnipeg, Canada uncovered a bunch of old currency stashed in the basement ceiling of his home during a renovation project. He found Canadian currency; ranging from regular and commemorative coins to paper money, including the 25 cent bills commonly known as shinplasters to $100 bills. The collection also included foreign cash from Weimar Germany, 1920s China and the United States, stamps from numerous countries and clippings from Winnipeg newspapers.
Photo by CBC News: Fred Murray finds, ready to shipped for auction.Fred Murray bought the old bungalow in Elmwood and recently decided to renovate the basement, spurred on by the federal government's home renovation tax credit. From older neighbours, Murray found out the house was built by a German immigrant named Albert Schmidt in the 1940s, whose identification he also found in the rafters. He lived in the home until sometime in the 1970s. It was when he ripped out ceiling panels in the 750 square foot home's basement that he realized he'd be supplementing that funding with some older money. When he encountered trouble feeding an electrical wire through the ceiling, he started to remove the panels. That's when he found the cash and coins packed in cloth bags, pill bottles and tobacco cans.
"The oldest coin I found was from 1859. It was a penny," Murray said.
"If it pays for the house, it's a bonus," said the 54-year-old.
He took his find to local collectors but said there wasn't much interest, so he plans to send everything to an auction house in Eastern Canada.
"It's all getting shipped off. I have no intentions of keeping it, and no one here in the city seems to be serious about it," he said.
"So I am shipping it off to Quebec and from there it goes to Toronto. And then it will end up in an auction."
While Murray said he knew nothing about collectible currency or stamps before his demolition find, he's now a little more up to speed. However, he's not interested enough to hold onto the collection and plans to ship it off this weekend to an Eastern Canada auction house. He said he has no idea what he'll get for the collection but plans to put it right back into the renovations.
I wish I am as lucky as this man but I think there are no interest because the item is not valuable to collector.
Source: CBC News, Toronto Sun.
