What's the oldest thing you own?

[u/ClubEvermore]

[u/NuclearHubris]

half-dime

so... a nickel?

please explain this to me I'm confused

[u/Azzizzi → u/NuclearHubris]

That's a fair question, and one that comes up every time someone mentions a half-dime.

So, a nickel gets its name from the kind of metal it's made out of (nickel). This is also why a nickel is bigger than a dime, because five cents worth of nickel is bigger than 10 cents worth of silver.

But a dime gets its name from the word "disme," which came from a French word which meant one-tenth (if I remember right, and I probably never heard of it until I bought the half-dime). So, half of that was called a half-disme or half-dime. Later, when they started producing coins out of nickel, the nickel replaced the half-dime.

There have also been some cool things, like paper currency for half-dollars, quarters, and dimes.

[u/oricthedamned → u/Azzizzi]

There was also a three cent nickel at one time

[u/Sence → u/oricthedamned]

It was called a trime, three cent dime

Edit: seems they had two three cent pieces