Coin-Voluted Words Quiz

This is a puzzle meant to test your knowledge of words as well as coins. Each sentence will make a statement about a coin or coins -- U.S. coinage, unless otherwise stipulated. The statement will be reasonably accurate, though not necessarily profound and possibly somewhat zany, and it will contain a clue about the coin or coins you are being asked to identify. The answer will appear in anagram form as part of the sentence -- and to help you find it, the word or words that make up the anagram will be capitalized.

Here's an example:

Get the idea?

Some of the coin-voluted words in the following sentences should be easy for you to rearrange. Others may take you longer -- and you might want to time yourself and then have your friends do the same, to see who's the best coin detective.

We hope you find this feature interesting, challenging -- and enjoyable. And, oh yes, try not to peek at the answers!

1. This small coin had MERIT as a way to pay for a postage stamp.
2. GLARE and SCENT are two ways to recognize these early U.S. coins.
3. This president who appears on several U.S. coins is identified with ILL., but not with CONN.
4. The U.S. Mint was ALL SET to use this experimental piece as a metric coin.
5. It's LEGAL to use these gold coins to pay a SHEAF of bills.
6. On these silver dollars, Miss Liberty exposes neither breasts NOR GAMS.
7. Collectors of late-date issues LOVE STORES that sell these small coins.
8. This commemorative half dollar is 90-percent silver, as ANY LAB will tell you.
9. Some who bounce these emergency-issue coins SWEAR they hear them CLINK.
10. You should be careful with these classic coins not to SLAB OLD RUST.

Ed Reiter is senior editor of COINage and author of the award-winning column "My Two Cents' Worth," which appears in the magazine each month. He wrote the weekly Numismatics column in the Sunday New York Times for nearly a decade, and also is former editor of Numismatic News.

For the answers, click here.