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Re: Decimalisation
Decimal coins were struck with "New pence" on them until the early 1980's, at which point the "new" was dropped.
Aside from minor design changes such as that, it really seems as though since the change to decimal British coinage has been subject to fairly frequent changes over the years in terms of size and shape of coins, at least far more so than in other countries. In LSD days, there was the change from the old silver 3d. to the yellow-gold coloured one in the 1940's (the silver one was criticized for being too small), but other than that the basic range of coins in everyday use remained pretty much the same shape and size for decades, right up until "D-Day." (The farthing was withdrawn in 1961, but that was simply because it was considered to be of so litte value by then as to not be worth keeping, so it wasn't really a change as such.) But look at what's happened since then: We got the 20p coin added to the range, then the £1 coin in place of the £1 note (Scotland excepted), the 5, 10 and 50p coins have all been shrunk in size, and now there's a £2 coin in the standard range as well. (And in the same way as the farthing was withdrawn earlier, the half new penny was later withdrawn as being of too little worth to keep.)
Compare with, for example, American coinage. Certainly the designs of the coins have had some revisions over the years, but the basic size and shape of the penny, nickel, dime, quarter, and half-dollar have been the same for decades.
Re the Max Bygraves song, a quick search turns it up here (a poor quality transfer, unfortunately):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCiEzQ4EGk4
Originally posted by Shado66
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Aside from minor design changes such as that, it really seems as though since the change to decimal British coinage has been subject to fairly frequent changes over the years in terms of size and shape of coins, at least far more so than in other countries. In LSD days, there was the change from the old silver 3d. to the yellow-gold coloured one in the 1940's (the silver one was criticized for being too small), but other than that the basic range of coins in everyday use remained pretty much the same shape and size for decades, right up until "D-Day." (The farthing was withdrawn in 1961, but that was simply because it was considered to be of so litte value by then as to not be worth keeping, so it wasn't really a change as such.) But look at what's happened since then: We got the 20p coin added to the range, then the £1 coin in place of the £1 note (Scotland excepted), the 5, 10 and 50p coins have all been shrunk in size, and now there's a £2 coin in the standard range as well. (And in the same way as the farthing was withdrawn earlier, the half new penny was later withdrawn as being of too little worth to keep.)
Compare with, for example, American coinage. Certainly the designs of the coins have had some revisions over the years, but the basic size and shape of the penny, nickel, dime, quarter, and half-dollar have been the same for decades.
Re the Max Bygraves song, a quick search turns it up here (a poor quality transfer, unfortunately):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCiEzQ4EGk4
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