The National Numismatic Collection (NNC) is America’s collection of monetary and transactional objects. It includes the famous coin collections of Josiah K. Lilly Jr. and Paul A. Straub. Both of these prolific collectors amassed extraordinary collections that have inspired an appreciation of coins in many others.

We asked the Friends of the NNC and NNC staff members to choose some of their favorite objects from these collections. Each object below is annotated with a note about who chose the coin and why they think it is an outstanding object.

To learn more about numismatics and coin collecting, we encourage you to continue to explore Learning Lab and see the links below.

• National Numismatic Collection, Education web page
• National Numismatic Collection, Object group
• National Museum of American History, Numismatic blog posts
• United States Mint, Learn
• Bureau of Engraving and Printing, U.S. Currency Education Program
• American Numismatic Association, Getting Started