I believe the likely answer is that 100 orders were never received for The Numismatist official reprint and that it never reached fruition.

It was Floyd Hazelwood, operating as Olympic Press, who reprinted the first six volumes of The Numismatist. Many reprints of Numismatist articles and Munro's Coins of Japan were among his other projects. Floyd told me that he and his son had no prior experience printing but that they bought a printing press, installed it in their basement and went to work! Over the years, Floyd would sell me batches of The Numismatist reprint which I generally sold for around $50. I think he probably had a quantity of unbound copies from the original print run and bound them up in small groups. I have seen a number of distinct crimson cloth bindings over the years.

In early 1977, I bought Floyd Hazelwood's library. Hailing from Salina, Kansas, Floyd was associated with the railroads and his library was sent to me via rail. When it arrived, the bottoms of many cartons were oil stained and the boxes were, by necessity, stacked outside my front door, where I unpacked them before bringing them into the house (it was not until the following year that I moved from home to an office).

Floyd had a fine library and most of it was sold in my third auction sale. Although Floyd and I never met we got along well and sort of kept in touch. When he passed away, I continued to buy things from his son, whose first name escapes me at present. Their substantial contribution to the dissemination of numismatic information seems hardly appreciated, then or now.

I found out about the reprint after the fact. I did some research and found the man who reprinted them from Kansas, wrote and ordered one. Seems like I got one of the last ones available, if not the last one. Vaguely recall the cost was $35 more or less. This "completed" my set of The Numismatist.

Let's see... it's been 46 years since the reprint was published... a copy just sold for $710... isn't it about time the ANA came out with a new printing at a reasonable price?

Incidentally, regarding the Frank Katen invoice indicating a 1965 sale for $50 - that $50 translates to $342.81 in 2009 dollars, so it didn't take very long for the book to become a pricey volume.

I read with interest the information about the ANA board authorizing the reprint of the first six volumes of The Numismatist in 1963. I have the hardcopy volume which I purchased a few years ago from a local numismatist who was disposing of his library. He had purchased the volume in 1963 as a member of the ANA. His price to me a few years ago was $100 which I then thought was fair. There is a lot of interesting reading in the first six volumes and I have not had any regrets in purchasing it.

There is another reprint of volume one only. The quality is not very good. I bought this from Bebee's – his 1976 price list says that it cost me $7.50. I sold it off when I got the Hazelwood reprint.

Weird, isn't it, that it took 15 years to get the first 100 orders at $8, then two years later the price jumped to $50, and now it's $700. You would think that ANA would go for a second printing to satisfy this sudden demand.

It was at least 15 or 20 years ago that The Money Tree received a box of the Numismatist reprint of the first six volumes from Sandy Durst, totally unexpected, almost like a throwaway punchline on a sitcom. I do remember my partner, Ken Lowe, hyperventilating as he always did upon the arrival of anything rare and unusual.

I can't recall what method we used to sell them, but they sold in a heartbeat. I don't think we ever sold more than one or two others after that in our 20 years in business. Many people, many times, have talked about another reprint, but I have no knowledge of anyone doing so. It is the genesis of the ANA, and makes for an interesting read.