Bowers on collecting: From 1954

In the December 1954 issue of The Numismatist Stuart Mosher presented the following:

Copper Quiz for Coin Collectors. Count five for each correct answer. If you score 70 you have a very fine score. Fifty or less is below average, while 90 or more is remarkable.

1. Which contains the most copper, a Lincoln cent of 1954 or a Jefferson nickel of 1954?
2. What country is famous for issuing the largest copper coins?
3. Approximately what percentage of copper will be found in foreign gold coins?
4. What country of ancient times used copper coins weighing about one pound and equal in value to one ox?
5. If you were to refine 20 pounds of current U.S. silver coins, how much copper would you obtain?
6. What country issued the same denomination and about the same type of copper coins for over 2,000 years?
7. Why are policemen sometimes called “cops,” or “coppers?”
8. What state in the U.S. produces the most copper?
9. What country in the world produces the most copper?
10. During the Civil War some people were called “copperheads.” Who were they?
11. Which is the better conductor of heat, iron or copper?
12. Which came first, the Copper (Bronze) Age or the Iron Age?
13. Name the one U.S. coin that did not contain copper as an alloy.
14. What is the largest English copper coin ever made?
15. For three years the United States made silver coins containing three parts silver and one part copper. What coin was it?
16. What is the chemical symbol for copper?
17. Name the one year between 1793 and 1857 when the United States did not strike copper coins.
18. Was copper ever used as an alloy in the silver coins of ancient Greece?
19. Give the name of at least one copper coin of ancient Rome.
20. What was the largest amount of money ever paid for a U.S. copper coin?

Please note: Correct answers as of 1954.

Answers:

1. The nickel containing 57.87 grains of copper against 33.60 grains in our current cent. (Since 1944).
2. Sweden with its copper plate money.
3. About 10 percent.
4. The Roman Republic around 300 B.C.
5. As they contain 10% copper you would get two pounds.
6. China, with its copper one-cash pieces.
7. Because the English police once wore large shiny copper buttons on their uniforms.
8. California.
9. United States of America.
10. Northerners who sympathized with the Confederates.
11. Copper.
12. The Copper or Bronze Age.
13. Steel cent of 1943.
14. Twopence of 1797.
15. Silver three-cent pieces of 1851-1853.
16. Cu.
17. 1815.
18. Yes.
19. Aes, Sestertius, Dupondius, Quadrans, Follis, Semis.
20. $2,500 paid by Henry Hines for a U.S. cent of 1799.

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