This extraordinary story can surprise anyone. A man from Louisiana named Otha Anders collected coins over a period of 45 years.
He managed to fill fifteen five-gallon plastic bottles with half a million cents.
When he got the idea to save his cents, he stopped spending them, and after each purchase, he still had three or four coins left.
“I never spent a cent; it was better to collect spare change. If I was somewhere and found a cent, I’d pick it up and keep it.
I’d tell people that I would give them a quarter in change, but since it’s a cent, I keep it,” Anders said.
As he was a school superintendent, the students knew about his passion and would save pennies to sell to him.
Eventually, Anders decided to take his “treasure” to the bank and called a delivery van to transport it.
He brought the coins to Origin Bank in Ruston, Louisiana, where he had been a long-time customer.
The coins were counted by a machine, which saved a lot of time, and the bank staff did their best to assist the man.
Some friends and family members also helped him. The plastic bottles were opened with an axe and a hammer.
The cents were then poured into the coin machine using small plastic buckets.
Anders sat next to the machine, watching his collection trickle down to the counter, and the bank employees changed the coin bag every 20 minutes.
The process took five hours. For all those coins, weighing 1,270 kilograms, the man received $5,136. He decided to spend the money on a well-deserved vacation.
Otha Anders has no desire to continue collecting coins. He will be looking for a different hobby.
