Do you ever pick up loose change you see lying around? It may not seem like much, but it can add up fast.
Imagine if you picked up every penny you found in one month. How many do you think you’d gather? Now, think bigger. What if you collected pennies for a whole year? How about for 45 years?
This guy named Otha Anders did just that. For 45 years, he collected pennies and surprised his bank tellers when he brought them in.
Otha Anders is a teacher from Louisiana. He started collecting coins in the late 1960s, not to get rich, but because he enjoyed it. Even when the government offered to pay $125 for every $100 of pennies turned in, he wasn’t tempted. He just liked having the collection.
Anders saw collecting pennies as a way to pray. “If I see a penny when I’m getting gas, on the ground, or in a store, it reminds me to stop and pray,” Anders told ABC News. “I always did that. That’s why they meant so much to me.”
During all his years of collecting pennies, Anders never took coins from anyone else as a gift. “But I never let anyone, not even my wife or kids, give me pennies without paying for them,” he said. “I wanted the special feeling that God and I got from building this collection.”
As time passed, Anders found it really important to pause and pray whenever he spotted a penny. He realized that on days when he wasn’t grateful enough, a penny would appear to remind him to be thankful for what he had.
Anders filled huge water jugs with the coins he gathered. He initially aimed to fill five jugs, but once he achieved that, he wanted to continue. He knew he had to take them to the bank or he’d never stop collecting. When he finally went to the bank, he had filled 15 large 5-gallon jugs with coins.
“I aimed to fill five big water jugs. That was my goal, but I just kept going. If I hadn’t taken them to the bank yesterday, I wouldn’t have stopped.”
Besides enjoying collecting pennies, Anders realized they also had a lot of money value. When he found out his home insurance wouldn’t cover his collection, he contacted Origin Bank in Ruston, Louisiana, where he’d been a customer for a long time.
Anders told them he was bringing in a lot of pennies. They were willing to assist, but it was a big task. “We appreciate his business, like all our customers,” said Jennie Cole, the bank’s Vice President. “If we can support Anders with his goals, we’re glad to do it.”
