How do you feel about gold Kennedys?

A longtime reader of Numismatic News sent me an email yesterday to tell me he disagreed with the Class of ’63 column I wrote in the March 4 issue.

I am glad he wrote to me.

Collectors have many similarities but our views, our goals and our personal tastes vary.

I will publish the comments in the Letters section of the newspaper, but I will publish it here as well. I hope it will encourage others to write when they have a different view to one expressed by me, or the writers of letters and Viewpoints.

A lively dialogue in Numismatic News is one of the reasons I first subscribed to it in 1969. That is why I consider letters and Viewpoints to be critically important.

The topic of yesterday’s email was the upcoming Kennedy half dollar program to mark the 50th anniversary of the design, which was introduced in March 1964.

“I can’t remember when I have ever disagreed with you, but with respect to your editorial on Page 6 of Numismatic News for March 4 I think that a gold 50th anniversary Kennedy half dollar would be appropriate and sensational and I would buy it in proof and enjoy it happily. I don’t feel compelled to buy every U.S. Mint coin issue, though I buy most, and I am not an automatic Kennedy fan, but the Kennedy half dollar is such a beautiful classical design and it would look great. I for one hope that the Mint will go ahead and produce it.”

This opinion is valuable for the Mint marketers. That is why they routinely conduct surveys of customers.

I do not expect my opinion will change the course of events. I also believe that the sender of this email is expressing an opinion that is shared by many. What I do not know is how many individual collectors that might be.

That is why other writers should express themselves.

Send me an email at david.harper@fwmedia.com. The letters section has plenty of space to give this and other topics a full airing.

It is not a matter of winning and losing, it is a matter of what coins set your heart racing so much that you have to buy them.

Buzz blogger Dave Harper is winner of the 2013 Numismatic Literary Guild Award for Best Blog and is editor of the weekly newspaper "Numismatic News."