History Main / NumberOneDime

* ''[[LetsPlay/LifeSMP 3rd Life SMP]]'': The Dogwarts banner which Scar steals on Day 5. It's from the first batch of banners created; when everyone else points out they have many more identical banners, Martyn says it holds sentimental value… hence Dogwarts' relentless attempts to kill Scar, since he's stuck the thing on his shield and has constantly held on to it. This culminates into literal ''battles'' where many server-members are killed, sometimes [[KilledOffForReal permanently]], [[spoiler:and Dogwarts never end up getting their banner back in the end.]]

* On the ''LetsPlay/DreamSMP'', Tommy's discs are practically worthless and are indistinguishable from any other copies of Cat and Mellohi, but the amount of memories attached to them gives them a lot of sentimental value to Tommy. The discs are so closely associated with him that they are seen as the IconicItem of the character's content creator counterpart.

* In "The Duck Knight Returns" Darkwing Duck actor [[spoiler:Drake Mallard]] has his dented Darkwing Duck lunchbox. The lunchbox is a reminder of how the old show taught him to always get back up when he first stood up against his school bully.

** And since the coin is his kryptonite, Batman’s been able to defeat him numerous times by taking away the coin. In “Almost Got’em” he stole the coin off Harvey and used it’s sharpened edge to cut through his bones to escape a death trap. And in another episode, Batman switched his coin with a trick coin that would always land on edge, leaving him unable to do anything because the coin wouldn’t tell Harvey what to do.

* In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask'' you receive the Keaton Mask from the Curiosity Shop owner, admitting the mask is worth very little but was symbolic to his relationship with Kafei.

* ''LightNovel/{{Durarara}}'': Ryo Takiguchi, a minor character from the same series, is implied to be this way about his harmonica. [[spoiler: This makes the fact that it gets destroyed during his brutal, undeserved beat-down rather [[TearJerker heartbreaking]]]].

* Ash's first hat in ''Anime/{{Pokemon}}''. He won it in a contest (there are only two hundred of them in existence), so it's one of his most valuable possessions. He went ballistic when a wild and mischievous Mankey stole it, making himself look stupid trying to get it back. Mankey then evolved into a Primeape once Team Rocket caused some shenanigans, becoming really aggressive and even harder to corral before Ash finally succeeded in reclaiming his hat and capturing the Primeape.\\\
Even so, Ash kept this hat with him through the rest of Kanto and all of Johto. One would almost think that this finally sunk in when he was heading off to Hoenn; maybe a hat with less sentimental value would be a better choice for someone continually targeted for mecha attacks. Hence, in Hoenn he wears a different hat that his mother gave him. And in Sinnoh he switches to yet another new hat. When this new hat is briefly stolen, Ash's attempts to recover it are less desperate than the time a Mankey stole his original hat, as he simply says it feels weird to not have a hat. [[note]]Imagine wearing glasses all your life and then getting laser surgery.[[/note]]

* In ''Girl Genius'' story ''Fanfic/RaisedByJagers'', Ducky has a pfennig coin she won from the neighborhood bully in a bet. She keeps it on her nightstand.

* In ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy2014'', Peter Quill faces the guards of the Kiln to retrieve his walkman and "Awesome Mix" cassette, one of his last mementoes of his late mother. Drax calls him "an imbecile" for risking his life for them.

* In the ''Film/{{Popeye}}'' [[TheMovie film adaptation]], one of Bluto's motivations for villainy (other than "I'm mean, if you know what I mean") is getting his hands on Poopdeck Pappy's treasure. When the treasure is finally revealed, it turns out to be things like pictures of Popeye (Pappy's son) as an "infink", Popeye's baby rattle, his baby booties, and other sentimental memento's of Popeye's childhood.

* Sam's lucky bottle cap in ''Series/{{Cheers}}''. The bottle cap represented something significant in his life: it was off the last bottle of "anything" he drank in his life and it stops him from drinking. At the end of the episode where it is lost, he opens a bottle of beer, pours it into a beer mug and stares at it. Finally Sam touches the mug ready to pick it up, but instead does his BarSlide trick perfectly. He then pockets his new lucky bottle cap.

* ''Series/OnlyMurdersInTheBuilding'' has Teddy Dimas showing he keeps an old silver coin framed for being a symbolic family heirloom: his grandma escaped from the Armenian genocide to New York, and while paying for the trip she was allowed to keep two coins to build a new life. She decided to only spent one.
* ''Series/PersonOfInterest''. Harold Finch has an OhCrap moment when Nathan Ingram's nephew finds the champagne cork from the bottle they used to celebrate the Machine going on line.
* ''Series/RelicHunter'': In "Diamond in the Rough", Sydney is hired to find the lucky baseball glove of 'Smiling' Jimmy Jonesboro, which was stolen during the 1946 World Series. Essentially worthless (Jonesboro bought it for one dollar at a garage sale), he was willing to pay $5000 to get it back in 1946. In the present day, a current major league player is willing to pay a seven figure sum to locate it, [[MagicFeather in the hope it will give him the same mojo Jonesboro had]].

* Music/ElvisPresley: ''Don't you step on my blue suede shoes''

* Linus' security blanket in ''ComicStrip/{{Peanuts}}''. Linus is fine as long as he has it, but removing it makes him increasingly nervous, tense, and erratic the longer they're separated. In one strip, Snoopy tries to do a dash-and-grab while Linus is seemingly dozing with it. Linus tightens his grip, snapping Snoopy back as it goes taut, spins around a couple times as Snoopy's still holding on, then does a whipping motion to make Snoopy let go. And then there's the times Lucy stolen or tried to steal it. Don't mess with the blanket.

* Lynne from ''VideoGame/GhostTrick'' always wears a fake police badge on her chest because a certain detective gave it to her when she was younger, and she pursued her dream to become one ever since.

* ''VideoGame/TheSims2'' ''Open For Business'' allows a sim starting a new business to frame the first simoleon they earn.

** Some of the Jägers get together and made a ridiculously huge, flame-spewing metal hat for Gil, who they respect a lot. Not only for his poppa's actions, but Gil had very recently taken down a couple of the clanks that were attacking the town, forcing the rest to retreat or surrender.

* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'', of course, has the {{Trope Namer|s}} dime, the first dime Scrooge ever earned, even if the person paying him was trying to skimp out on payment. In the cartoon it's given more of a vaguely mystical nature, since on the occasions when it does go missing, Scrooge's fortune starts to fall apart. It's also made explicit any power it has comes from Scrooge's long possession, meaning traveling to the past to seize it Will Not Work.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' did it too, in the form of Mr. Burns's old teddy bear, Bobo.
** Which was a parody of ''Film/CitizenKane'''s Rosebud.

* FanFic/AGrowingAffection has Naruto's birthday kunai. And while they are weapons (and are used as such at one point), they are cheap, mass-produced version that are designed to be regularly lost or broken on a mission, and recycled rather than maintained. He keeps them in a special case and replaced the normal white cotton hand wraps with silk. They were birthday gifts from Hinata and Sakura while he was training with Jiraiya; they are two of the first birthday gifts he ever got, and also a reminder that even though they were apart, his friends were still thinking of him.

* In ''Film/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy'', Peter Quill faces the guards of the Kiln to retrieve his walkman and "Awesome Mix" cassette, one of his last mementoes of his late mother. Drax calls him "an imbecile" for risking his life for them.

** Scrooge's EvilCounterpart, Flintheart Glomgold, has his Number One Rand in answer to Scrooge's Number One Dime, which is slightly weird since South-Africa hasn't been using rands for long enough that Flintheart could have earned one in his youth. Whether he's lying about it to screw with Scrooge, or that someone cheated him out of payment as well is anyone's guess. Another guess is that Glomgold stole the rand from somebody. Creator/DonRosa supports this theory.

* Butch's watch in ''Film/PulpFiction'', which belonged to his father who died in Vietnam. We see just how important it is to him when he finds out that it was left behind as he's on the run from his boss' hit men, and decides to risk his life by going back to his apartment to retrieve it.

* ''Franchise/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles'': Slash, a recurring EvilCounterpart to the Turtles across multiple continuities, often carries around a small plastic palm tree that he cherishes. In continuities where his origins are as a mutated terrestrial turtle, it's decoration that was in his tank when he was a normal turtle, that he carries as a keepsake.

* The TropeNamer was parodied in Issue 102 of ''ComicBook/TheSimpsons'' ''Uncle Burn$'', with Mr. Burns's lucky number one penny. Burns used the penny to earn his fortune during the gold rush, by [[AbnormalAmmo loading it into a gun]] and robbing miners. Bart, in revenge for Burns cutting his rope to get the penny when it fell off, uses it to get the floating key of Strobl away from the volcano.

* ''ComicBook/UncleScrooge'': The TropeNamer is Scrooge [=McDuck=]'s First Dime. [[DependingOnTheWriter Many authors]] just make it a lucky talisman, but at least Keno Creator/DonRosa, building on the original work by Creator/CarlBarks, makes it clear its value is sentimental. It was originally established that the dime is not inherently lucky but that being so important to and belonging for so long to the richest duck in the world who worked hard and fair for his wealth has given it power, hence the [[TheDeterminator implacable]] Magica de Spell's obsession with getting it to create a talisman that will make her the most powerful witch. Although other characters in Rosa's version of the ComicBook/DisneyDucksComicUniverse have ascribed it the power of being lucky, [[strike:Creator/DonRosa]] Scrooge [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall sets the record straight]] in ''[[ComicBook/TheLifeAndTimesOfScroogeMcDuck The Richest Duck in the World]]'':

* Dagny Taggart of ''Literature/AtlasShrugged'' has two -- a bracelet from her eventual lover Hank Rearden ("the first thing ever made of Rearden Metal"), making her analogous to Magica de Spell; and the first coin she ever earned working in the capitalist {{utopia}} Atlantis, making her analogous to Scrooge [=McDuck=]. The [[HonestCorporateExecutive similarities]] between the novel and the TropeNamer [[GoodPaysBetter hardly]] [[SelfMadeMan stop]] [[GoodIsNotNice there]].

* ''WesternAnimation/DuckTales1987'', of course, has the TropeNamer dime, the first dime Scrooge ever earned, even if the person paying him was trying to skimp out on payment. In the cartoon it's given more of a vaguely mystical nature, since on the occasions when it does go missing, Scrooge's fortune starts to fall apart. It's also made explicit any power it has comes from Scrooge's long possession, meaning travelling to the past to seize it Will Not Work.

In any case, should the item be damaged or lost, it is likely to trigger a HeroicBSOD or a RoaringRampageOfRevenge, which [[DisproportionateRetribution sometimes leads]] to an ArsonMurderAndJaywalking moment. If dropped, they will do an IndyHatRoll to retrieve it. Merely being separated from the item is also likely to make them utterly distraught. However, some characters may at one point entrust the item to someone they know and hold in high regard, leading to a PrizedPossessionGiveaway or HoldOnToMyHat.

* On the ''LetsPlay/DreamSMP'', Tommy's discs are practically worthless and are indistinguishable from any other copies of Cat and Mellohi, but the amount of memories attached to them gives them a lot of sentimental value to Tommy. The discs are so closely associated with him that they are seen as the IconicItem of the character's [[LetsPlay/TommyInnit content creator counterpart]].

Hats, {{Nice|Hat}} or otherwise, are frequent Number One Dimes. Expect TheChewToy or the ButtMonkey's precious and rare Gobi Desert Cricket to be frequently threatened. If the character in question is a child (or a [[ManChild child at heart]]), the Number One Dime will probably be a toy.

* ''Webcomic/GirlGenius'' Jägers appear to have this relation with their {{Nice Hat}}s.

* ''Franchise/{{Tintin}}'': Captain Haddock almost gets himself killed over his sailor's cap in ''Prisoners of the Sun'': who'd want to live without their NiceHat?

* Lothar from ''Webcomic/ExterminatusNow'' will go [[BerserkButton utterly friggin' berserk]] if you touch his NiceHat.

* The above number one dime was parodied in Issue 102 of ''ComicBook/TheSimpsons'' ''Uncle Burn$'', with Mr. Burns's lucky number one penny. Burns used the penny to earn his fortune during the gold rush, by [[AbnormalAmmo loading it into a gun]] and rob miners. Bart, in revenge for Burns cutting his rope to get the penny when it fell off, uses it to get the floating key of Strobl away from the volcano.

* Instead of spending the sixpence Donald Carmichael gives her in ''Literature/ALittlePrincess'', Sara keeps it to remind herself that, in spite of all the cruelty she's endured, there ''are'' still kind people in the world. The film version starring Amelia Thankley adds some ShipTease to her keeping the coin, as well ("I shall always wear it to remember you by.").

* In ''WesternAnimation/LiloAndStitch'', Lilo has a photograph of her parents who were killed in an automobile accident, and it holds priceless sentimental value for her. When Stitch held it, Lilo snaps at him to never touch it.

* ''ComicBook/UncleScrooge'': The TropeNamer is Scrooge [=McDuck=]'s First Dime. [[DependingOnTheWriter Many authors]] just make it a lucky talisman, but at least Keno Creator/DonRosa, building on the original work by Creator/CarlBarks, makes it clear its value is sentimental. It was originally established that the dime is not inherently lucky but that being so important to and belonging for so long to the richest duck in the world who worked hard and fair for his wealth has given it power, hence the [[TheDeterminator implacable]] Magica de Spell's obsession with getting it to create a talisman that will make her the most powerful witch. Although other characters in Rosa's version of the ComicBook/DisneyDucksComicUniverse have ascribed it the power of being lucky, [[strike:Creator/DonRosa]] Scrooge [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall sets the record straight]] in ''[[Comicbook/TheLifeAndTimesOfScroogeMcDuck The Richest Duck in the World]]'':

* In the film adaptation of ''Comicbook/LargoWinch'', multimillionaire Nerio Winch recounts to Largo why his switchblade is his most prized possession: It's the first thing he bought with his own money ''and'' how he finally stood up to his abusive father.

* ''[[VideoGame/MassEffect1 Mass Effect]]'':

-->'''Spongebob:''' That's a dime?\\

--->'''Spongebob''': What'd you give him?
--->'''Krabs''': ''(hops on deck, revealing that only one arm, half his torso, and his head are left)'' Nothing important!

** In "The Ballad of Duke Baloney!" it's revealed that many years ago, Scrooge paid a dime to the South African shoeshine boy Duke Baloney in an attempt to replicate his own origin. Unlike Scrooge, [[spoiler:Duke took offense that the rich duck shortchanged him (Scoorge actually fell unconscious from the job, so he couldn't really take offense anyway), demanding the dollar fee for the shine. Then when Scrooge refused and insulted him, Duke stole a money clip from Scrooge that contained two million dollars, and used the money to start a business under the alias "Flintheart Glomgold" to have his revenge on Scrooge]].

* For ComicBook/TwoFace of ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' fame, it's a [[TwoHeadedCoin double-headed silver dollar]], one side of which has been scratched and defaced. Which side lands face-up determines how he acts. It's had different origins over the years, thanks to {{Retcon|s}}.

* For ComicBook/TwoFace of ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' fame, it's a [[TwoHeadedCoin double-headed silver dollar]]. ''ComicBook/TheLongHalloween'' explains that he got it as a present from his father when he visited him at his insane asylum on Father's Day. He uses it to avoid the stress of making difficult decisions and to absolve himself of the guilt for his actions which does allows him to make tough calls more quickly if somewhat unpredictably.
** For extra angst, one story relates how Harvey Dent's father would religiously flip a coin: heads, he would beat him; tails, he let it be. ''The coin was [[TwoHeadedCoin double-headed]]''.
** Both of these are fairly recent {{retcon}}s. Originally, Two-Face's [[TwoHeadedCoin double-headed coin]] was a symbol used by a mob boss that Harvey Dent finally managed to prosecute, using one of his coins as a key piece of evidence. When Dent refused to be bribed or scared off, the crime lord had one of his goons throw acid in Dent's face, creating Two-Face, who subsequently scarred up one side of the coin to better tie it to himself as a symbol of what he had become.
** Another issue has Two-Face using a replica because Batman kept the original after sending him back to Arkham. [[FallenHero He wanted something to remember Harvey by.]]