Pro tip: check inside board games before buying at yard sales

Last Saturday I grabbed a vintage Monopoly set at a yard sale in Salem for $5. Got it home and opened it up, found a 1950s silver dollar tucked inside the money tray. Must have been used as a token by some kid back in the day. Anyone else ever find hidden cash or collectibles inside thrift store items like this?

2 comments

2 Comments

adam_robinson10h ago

Hold on there, I gotta correct something real quick. That silver dollar you found is actually super rare but it's not quite from the 1950s. The Franklin half dollar was introduced in 1948 but the regular silver dollars like the Morgan or Peace dollars stopped being minted in 1935, so if it's really a silver dollar it's gotta be from the 1930s or earlier. I'm thinking you probably actually found a silver half dollar or maybe a silver certificate instead, that's the more common thing to find stuffed in old board games from that era. Still a sweet find though, I once pulled a 1922 Peace dollar from a copy of Clue I bought at a thrift store in Portland. People back then just used actual coins as game pieces all the time, it wasn't weird to them like it is now.

riley_price6h ago

The 1922 Peace dollar in a Clue game is wild, @adam_robinson. Honestly I didn't even know people tucked real silver in there like that. I thought my find was just a weird fluke. Now I'm wondering how many other old board games have secret cash hiding in them. I'm about to start hitting every yard sale in the area looking for vintage Monopoly sets. That's the kind of luck you dream about when you're digging through old junk.