Wheat Cent

Have you ever seen a funny penny? One that doesn't have the Lincoln Memorial on the back? From 1909 to 1958, wheat pennies were produced with Lincoln on one side and "one cent" with two stalks of wheat on the other.

My dad likes to collect things, mainly baseball cards and coins. But he always tells us that he if we ever see this funny to give it to him. Now that I have an actually job that I deal with money regularly, I come across lots of wheat pennies. Somehow my brother and I have come to enjoy this too. When we find them, we get excited and look at the year to see if it's !1943!.... I made the mistake of telling my brother that if he ever finds a 1943 wheat penny, we'll be rich.

In 1943, twelve pennies were made out of copper instead of the silver by mistake. Copper was being used for war supplies - tanks and ammunition. But now these pennies are super rare and can be worth a fortune. I think in 2004, one was sold for $200,000. But now my brother will call everyone asking what the year was supposed to be... and its never the right one. But actually my dad's got some of the steel pennies. Actually he's got about 600 pennies..... that is only $6... to you at least. Some pennies are actually worth between 5-12 cents.

Actually the wheat penny was designed by Victor David Brenner - a sculptor. But on the wheat penny, you can see the initials, VDB, hidden on Lincoln's shoulder. Also there's supposed to be a controversy about the wheat on the penny or the initials... I'm not sure. But it's been 100 years since the lincoln penny was minted so there'll be 4 new designs releasing this year.