With their former countrymen divided and lacking a monarch after the English Civil War, Colonists seized an opportunity to create their own currency, establishing a mint in 1652 in downtown Boston — the first in New England and second in North America — to produce three silver coins: a threepence, a sixpence, and a shilling.

It always helps to have a little bit of coin around -- whether that be commonplace coins you keep in your purse for everyday usage, "coin" as in general money or even, in some special cases,