Coin Collecting at the Safir House
Ruben Safir Coins Collection: Polish Food for All - First Food Commemerative
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Coin Collecting at the Safir House
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The Polish entry into the 1971 Food for All Program is one of the unsual
coins that we have come across for several reasons. First of all, the
subject matter would get the attention of most Americans as it's obverse
is an iconographic image of a nuring infant. Americans wouldn't
put this on a coin, but the Poles, especially when still behind the
Iron Curtain, would and did. And it is a nice design, well balanced
and with occusive aspects to it. It doesn't have a traditional rim,
but it is struck on an upset coin blank. So it has a spoon like curve
in the coin. The coin came raw and had a nice bronze tint, but it went
to ANACS for conservation and grading and the result wa a lovely metalic
color of the coin.
It came in two varieties that are listed in Krause:
Pr185 1971 - 10 Zotych. Copper-Nickel. Eagle with wings
open. Baby nursing in front of world globe, FAO above.There is about
51K coins minted
Pr186 1971 -
The other is plain nickel and was minted for the elite of the Polish
governmen and this coin is hard to find. Krause has it minted at about
500 coins, but I've heard that these numbers are very rough and not to
be taken seriously.
I'm sort of looking for one of these at a reasonable cost. Being nickel
it should be magnetic.
One of the interesting aspects of collecting foriegn coins, is that sometimes the ethnic values of a the culture produces a coin design that would be significantly different than anything that would be produced in the US. This pattern coin is of a bare breast and an infant in a kiss that would represent a nursing child. The coin might well be unique in all of world coinage.
