I’m old enough to remember when Britain still used pounds, shillings, and pence for currency before the nation switched to the decimal system in February 1971. You would think a system based on units of ten would be easier to figure out than one that used twelves — in the old money 12d = 1 shilling and 20 shillings = 1 pound (or 240d) — but for a lot of people it wasn’t. Despite a long government campaign explaining it, the supermarkets and grocers were full of confused old ladies complaining they didn’t understand this new-fangled money.
But us kids all thought the new coins were great and couldn’t wait to get some because they were new and shiny and grown-ups didn’t like them. I do miss the old money names though, like a Tanner (sixpence), Bob (shilling), Guinea (21 shillings), Half a Crown (two shillings and sixpence). The thrupenny bit was a nice heavy little coin to hold in your grubby kid hands too, and a paper 10-bob note felt like a more special gift from an Uncle than a 50p coin.
There have been enough cover versions of “Money” over the years to earn a very large pile of shillings for its composers, and this is one of the newer ones I like. This was a bonus track on a limited-edition CD release of Charli’s Sucker album and sounds more like she’s covering The Flying Lizards than the original.
Download: Money (That’s What I Want) – Charli XCX (mp3)
cryingallthewaytothechipshop.wordpress.com 
I have a collection of a mint farthing, half penny, penny, three pence piece, six pence piece, shilling, florin and a half crown, also have a ten shilling note.
by the way a half crown was two shilling and sixpence
cheers
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I think the new pound coin is a tribute to the thrupenny bit.
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Bugger, thanks Benny. I actually knew that, it’s a typo not an error if you know what I mean
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Schools in Essex in the 60s tried the gimcrack ‘ITA’ phonetic alphabet (because learning 35 letters is easier than learning 26, or something) but I’d already started learning to read so I had to learn three times in two years. Then they decimalised so I had to learn to count all over again.
And even aged 5 I knew that ‘Decimal 5’, the ‘Magic Roundabout’replacement with The Scaffold and Robert Dougal, was downright weird.
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Off topic, sorry, but saw the new Destroyer album in the top right of the blog. Excited to hear that!
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It’s good!
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Started primary school in 1970 so it was New Money from the start and I never learned about the old stuff. I remember my Mum always having thrupenny bits in the bottom of her purse though, and that the one-eyed bandits at the fair took old pennies well after everything else went decimal.
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Didn’t they keep the actual shilling and half crown coins in circulation well into the eighties I think, and just called them 5p and 10p? Alongside newly minted decimal coinage?
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They used the shilling and florin for the five and ten pence pieces the shilling up until 1990 and the florin until 1993
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I remember the Half Crown coin sticking around for a while but don’t think I ever saw a florin
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Whenever I hear the term Decimalisation this tune by the Scaffold comes into my head. Shows just how absorbent the 7 year old brain is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G76Zp0mxIGo
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Shillings and florins remained in circulation until the size of the equivalent 5p and 10p pieces changed in the early 90s. Half crowns disappeared pretty quickly – why would you want a 12 and a half p coin? On the other hand the pre-decimal 6d (2 and a half p) continued for a long time because it was used in so many vending machines.
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