Commemorating the 60th Anniversary of the National Service program in Australia a 2011 dated 50c coin was released by the Royal Australian Mint in Canberra. This National Service 50c was issued in a card (for $8.95) and in a PNC.

The PNC as seen below was released by Australia Post for $14.95. Both the coin and the 60c stamp depict the National Service Memorial at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, ACT. The coin is dated 2011 and the PNC postmarked 8 September 2010, the day this memorial was officially opened.

Australia 2010 National Service PNC

Australia 2011 National Service 50c

2011 sees the 60th anniversary of Australia's National Service program which commenced in 1951 before stopping in 1959 and then being adopted again in a different form in 1964 and running through to December 1972. The initial period of National Service (or less euphemistically conscription) required that all Australian males aged 18 to complete nearly 6 months of training followed by five years of service in the Commonwealth Military Forces. The second period of National Service (from 1964) required two years of service in the regular armed forces followed by 3 years in the reserves. During the 18 years of the two programs more than 287,000 "Nasho's" served Australia and 212 of these young men died while on active duty, 2 in Borneo and 210 in the Vietnam Conflict.

On the 8th of September 2010 those who served under the National Service program were invited to parade along Anzac Parade to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra where the National Service Memorial was officially opened. The Royal Australian Mint has taken part in the program with the release of a non circulating cupro-nickel 50c coin, one of which was laid in place under the dedication plaque during the memorial's construction. This coin is available to collectors in a PNC and as a carded issue. Seen above the coin bears the standard Ian Rank-Broadley portrait of Her Majesty. The reverse, sculpted by Wojciech Pietranik, shows the new National Service Memorial surrounded by the words "DEDICATED TO ALL AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL SERVICEMEN AND IN MEMORY OF THOSE WHO DIED". The National Service Memorial comprises a square sandstone plinth representing the Army, upon this rests a polished granite slab with the reflection of the sky representing the Air Force, while on this is a bronze bowl filled with water depicting the Navy. Within the bronze bowl is a triangular element which depicts the co-operation of the three armed services and their importance in our society. At the bottom corner of the Memorial is a representation of the National Service Medal which each "Nasho" is entitled to wear. Personally I find this coin to be just about the most attractive Australian 50c coin minted and given the popularity of military themed coins it is sure to be a popular issue.

Thank you to those who served.

You may or may not remember us reproducing the article we wrote for the Australian Coin and Banknote Magazine about a number of double struck $2 coins that had appeared on the market over the preceding 7 or 8 months. At the time of writing that article 5 of these coins (3 2008's and 2 2009's) had appeared on the market, one via a room auction, one via a coin dealers mail catalogue, and three on eBay. Well interestingly another one has appeared on eBay in the last 24 hours. This is another 2009 coin and appears to be of a similar grade to the other 5, it's got two visible dates (which is more desirable than just one date). The second strike is rotated about 90% from the first and offset by about 40-50% to the first. It will be interesting to see what price it realises and how it compares with the others.

2009 Double Struck $2 Coin eBay Auction

edit 1 Oct 2010: Realised price $1092.69

There's been a couple of poor taste remarks in some well known dealers' mail order catalogues recently directed at PCGS graded coins. Given that PCGS graded coins are becoming more and more common place in the market these days (a quick eBay search shows more than 200 slabbed Australian coins available right now) you'd think that these dealers would be trying their best to learn and move along with what the market is saying. But no, they have to stick their heads in the sand and try to dictate to the market what it is that collectors want. In my experience this is a well known short cut to a drop in sales and a quick exit from whatever industry you happen to be in. Here's a gem of a comment from a well known dealer in their latest mail out offering.

...which has been slabbed and graded by P.C.G.S. as VERY FINE - IT IS NOT VERY FINE! This coin I wold grade FINE+ which is two grades below P.C.G.S. The moral to the story is, when buying or trading any third party graded coins or banknotes, make sure they are correctly graded and priced accordingly.

Well there's a couple of points that this 'expert' has clearly missed.

1. PCGS probably have graded the coin correctly as VF30 according to the Sheldon scale that they use. Nowhere do they say that it is graded as Very Fine according to any adjectival grading scale, nor do they say it is graded according to ANDA standards. They have graded it according to the standards they've made available quite publically here: PCGS Grading Standards. What standards does the dealer who publishes this catalogue grade to? Well your guess is as good as mine because it doesn't say in their catalogue.

2. Ignorance is only brought into sharp relief when displayed from a position of self assumed expertise. The advice to make sure that slabbed coins are graded correctly is good but the key point has been missed. PCGS DO NOT GRADE TO AUSTRALIAN STANDARDS. Do Australian dealers hang their heads in shame when English dealers grade Australian UNC coins as EF or gEF? I think not, a lot of English dealers use different and much tougher standards to grade coins than here in Australia.

I can only hope that dealers like this one either learn to move with the times or are pushed to one side as the market moves forward. Reputable third party grading is better for the industry, PCGS have no hidden agenda with regards to the Australian coin industry and they probably provide as close to an unbiased grading service for Australian coins as can be had anywhere. I may be an un-trusting soul, but whose grading would I trust first? A dealer that I don't know at all who has to make a profit and whose gradings might be coloured by this motivation or a company who really doesn't care if a coin is graded VF30 or F15 as long as the grading complies with their own standards. I'll let you decide.

An unsorted accumulation of old 1c and 2c

We get a lot of questions from newbie collectors and non-collectors about coins or accumulations of coins they've either found or inherited. Maybe you've given the shed a clean-up and have a jar of old 1c and 2c or you've been given a bag of old pennies or halfpennies that Grandpa has had hiding in the garage for 40 years. What do you do and where do you start? We've written a more detailed article before about where to go from here, this article is more about identifying verdigris on copper and what verdigris is.

Verdigris is a corrosive copper cancer and once it has formed on copper coins it's impossible to remove. It eats into the coin surface and will grow and spread assisted by a damp environment....even onto other coins nearby. So the first most important step when deciding what to do with those coins you've found is go through them and remove the one's that have green on them, the more severe is shown below.

2c Affected by Verdigris

What I suggest to people is to remove these green affected coins and place them into a "quarantine" bag or area for the time being until you can go through them and see if any are worthy of attempted salvage. For common date coins the most practical solution now is to send them for recycling. For potentially more valuable coins such as the 1925 penny in the group I'd suggest talking to your dealer or getting advice from numismatic experts as cleaning these coins or attempting to clean them will almost always do more harm than good. Attempted conservation should only be sought on rarer errors or key date coins. For more general coins in your collection which don't have significant value that you have interest in keeping there's only one method that I'd try on verdigris on copper. That is a good soak in olive oil. This will soften any debris on the coin surface so the damage won't worsen but for a severe verdigris which has eaten into the coin surface there isn't really any solution.

The answer to this is to store the coins properly from the start and remove those affected by verdigris so it cannot spread onto other coins.

We've spoken about the new Secure Plus service offered by PCGS before and at that time it seemed expensive and quite out of reach for the everyday collector. We were lucky enough to have the opportunity to submit a coin under this service so we can bring you the details.

How can you tell if a PCGS slab has been submitted to the Secure Plus Service? See the Secure Plus slab below.

PCGS Secure Plus Slab

Different to the Secure Plus Service, coins submitted under a higher service level -those coins with a high value and a quick PCGS turnaround will be given a plus grading if they meet certain grading criteria. See below for a coin with a + grading. This plus to the grade could add hundreds or thousands of dollars value to a coin.

PCGS Graded Coin achieving a plus grade