Welcome to The E-Sylum: Volume 3, Number 19, May 7, 2000: an electronic publication of the Numismatic Bibliomania Society. Copyright (c) 2000, The Numismatic Bibliomania Society. SUBSCRIBER UPDATES We have one new subscriber this week: Mitch Hight. Welcome aboard! This brings our subscriber count to 300, a new milestone for The E-Sylum. SUBSCRIBER PROFILE: MITCH HIGHT Mitch Hight is the founder of Coin-Gallery Online http://www.coin-gallery.com - one of the leading numismatic resource sites on the Internet. A dedicated fan of the Gallery Mint Museum's mission statement, he donates resources to develop the GMM web site located at http://www.coin-gallery.com/gmm He has been involved in numismatics for over 30 years and is a life member of the American Numismatic Association (LM4755). AMERICAN NUMISMATIC FILMMAKER KILLED IN ROAD RAGE. Dick Johnson reports: "Michael Craven, who had built a reputation in the numismatic field as a promising filmmaker was killed Sunday April 30 at 1 AM on a Los Angeles Freeway. Following a confrontation with youths in a stolen Chevrolet Suburban he had pulled off the Ventura Freeway at Barham Boulevard exit. When he stepped out of his jeep the youths struck him and left the scene. He was dead on arrival at Cedars Sinai Hospital in West Hollywood. Craven, 44, had produced a number of videos for the numismatic field. These included: "The Granite Lady" (on the San Francisco Mint), "Keys To The Treasury" (on the U.S. Treasury), ".900 Fine" (on the Carson City Mint) and "The Medal Maker" (written by D. Wayne Johnson and narrated by former chief mint engraver, Elizabeth Jones, on Laura Gardin Fraser). He had interviewed and filmed more than forty numismatists and dozens of U.S. Mint and Engraving and Printing officials for a major film documentary on the history of American money. The project had occupied nearly three years of his time and had amassed over 20 hours of film. According to close friend Dick Johnson he had edited this to a six-hour documentary and had less than fifteen minutes to complete the final segment." GREAT DEBATE LEADS TO LEGAL ACTION An article by Victoria Stone Moledor in the May 15 issue of COIN World states: "The heated discussion over the authenticity of gold western assay bars that culminated in a live debate last summer in August 1999 has reared its head again. Attorneys for John J. Ford, Jr., Stack's L.L.C. of New York City and Harvey Stack filed suit April 27 with the U.S. District Court in the Southern District of New York against Theodore V. Buttrey." FUNCTION ASSOCIATES BECOMES LAKE BOOKS Fred Lake sends this announcement: "Function Associates has changed its name to Lake Books and has its 52nd mail-bid sale of numismatic literature ready to send to all NBS members who would like a copy. The catalog contains 655 lots and has a closing date of May 23, 2000. You may request a copy by emailing fredlake@aol.com and specifying which of the three available formats you would like. They are MS Word, PDF, and WordPerfect. The sale features items covering the broad range of numismatics and includes items from the libraries of Col. William "Bill" Murray and George Dillingham (among others)." NBS BIBLIOGRAPHY UPDATED NBS Board Member Larry Mitchell has added the following sections on Modern Coinages to the NBS Bibliography, available on our web site at: http://www.coinbooks.org/ 83. SCANDINAVIA 84. ENGLAND 85. BRITISH COLONIES & COMMONWEALTH 86. IRELAND 87. SCOTLAND ENGLISH-LANGUAGE BOOKS ON ORIENTAL COINS George Kolbe writes: "Another interesting and informative big E. Some "off the top of my head" opinions about Mike Jones's queries: 1. [Ramsden] Most of Ramsden's monographs are uncommon. The mother lode, and the source of many of them, is "The Philatelic and Numismatic Journal of Japan" (or something similar), where many of his numismatic contributions first appeared. I believe it ceased publication upon his death. 2. [Munro] Not a rare book. Guess on original printing: 1000 or so copies. 3. [Schjoth] Ditto. 4. [Polder] I believe I've had this a few times as an extract from the publication in which it originally appeared. I do not recall offhand whether it was issued separately. 5. [Kann] Ditto no. 2. 6. [Toda] I recall having the original once or twice but I would guess it is truly a rare work. There is some sort of a reprint I believe. A Bowker bibliography (if your interest is limited to English publications) or a Coole bibliography (it incorporates Bowker and oh so much more) should provide further information." Howard A. Daniel III of Deltaville, VA writes: "In response to Mike Jones' request for information on the scarcity of several references about East Asian coins. Number 6 on his list is Toda on Annamese. I have an original edition of the society's journal with Toda's article about Vietnamese cash-style coins. I made the high bid in a book auction about 20+ years ago and have not seen another original since that time. But copies of Toda have been printed by several dealers for collectors to use and I believe Scott Semans probably has one of these copies for sale." Joe Boling writes: "I have never found Van de Polder in the marketplace; my Xerox copy is from the University of Washington library, c1971. Ramsden’s Numismatic and Philatelic Journal of Japan was reprinted in its entirety (four volumes bound in two) in the ’80s. I've never seen another copy of the reprint besides mine. I have the odd reprint of various other Ramsden works as well, and some original booklets/folders of hansatsu sold by Jun Kobayagawa, Ramsden’s business partner in Yokohama (either Ramsden’s son-in-law or brother-in-law, I can never remember which). The original Munro appears every couple of years in auctions, and the 1962 reprint about once a year. Original Todas appear every few years, but that was reprinted by Bruce Smith several years ago. Original Kanns on Chinese coinage appear about once a year; it was also reprinted. Much more scarce is the 1927(?) Kann on currency systems and exchange rates, which has also been reprinted. The original Schjoth appears every couple of years; I never bought one because the Hancock edition has so much more information in it." NUMISMATIC NOMENCLATURE On Mike's topic of numismatic terminology, George Kolbe signed his note thusly: "Respectfully, George Kolbe, Nb. [Numismatic Bibliophilologist]" CATALOGUE versus CATALOG Dick Johnson writes: "Catalogue is a proper term in England (and France). In America the proper term is CATALOG. For Americans to use the term CATALOGUE comes off a little ostentatious (read "show off"). Thank goodness however, we have no American dealers who COULD use the term SYLLOGE (which means "the systematically arranged contents of a collection"). As for 'catalogues", George Kolbe confirms: "It's less serious if you pay for it. ;-)" CATALOGUE RAISONNE Dick Johnson goes on to note: "There is one more term that might also possibly be used: CATALOGUE RAISONNE. Obviously French, it means the most complete possible listing, as the entire life's work of an artist, irrespective of who owns the items or where they are located -- every item completely described and annotated. The latter is the end product of a very competent cataloger (note: he is not a cataloguer)." WHO'S JOSHING WHO? Regarding the story of Josh Tatum, Carl C. Honore writes: "I have published some information with Mike Hodder's help in my upcoming book "The Life and Times of the Liberty Nickel" on the origin of the term "to Josh". Apparently the author Henry Wheeler Shaw wrote some works before 1880 under the nom de plume Josh Billings. One of these was "Josh Billings's Farmer's Almanac". Another was "Josh Billing's Sayings"; from these to "Josh" someone could have emerged. This is not to say that Josh Tatum didn't exist. He possibly did and Mike mentioned that there may even be a photograph of him someplace. It's just that the term is probably more likely to have come from the former source." On the same topic NBS Board member Pete Smith writes: "For a long time I have suspected that the Josh Tatum story was more fancy than fact and have sought confirmation, one way or another. I was excited when I viewed the "History, Money in Your Hands" video distributed by the ANA since it included a picture of Tatum. I asked James Taylor about the source of that picture. He admitted that it was an error and the picture was really someone else. A few years ago we had a file clerk working for us who returned to law school. He did quite well in law school and was editor of the law review. I gave him the story of Tatum and asked him to do a search of legal sources looking for confirmation of the Tatum story. He was not able to find anything. One problem, known from other examples, is that most old records have not been converted to searchable forms. I think it would be an interesting exercise for E-Sylum readers to try to come up with the first published reference to Tatum. If he existed, and if there was a trial, there would be references in local (Boston?) papers from the era." Back to Josh Billings: the New York Public Library catalog (http://www.nypl.org/) lists several titles between 1865 and 1880, and the following entry is found at the Electric Library (http://www.encyclopedia.com/): Billings, Josh 1818-85, American humorist; b. Lanesboro, Mass. His popular, humorous sketches in rural dialect appeared annually in the Farmer's Allminax (1869-80). There are several web sites that cite quotes from the Billings works. Here are a few: Always live within your income, even if you have to borrow money to do so. Don't ever prophesy; for if you prophesy wrong, nobody will forget it; and if you prophesy right, nobody will remember it. In youth we run into difficulties. In old age difficulties run into us. FEATURED WEB SITE This week's featured web page is a new feature of the United States Mint web site. Designed for kids, it is an interesting educational presentation about how modern coins are made. http://www.usmint.gov/kids/tour/index.html Wayne Homren Numismatic Bibliomania Society The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. For more information please see our web site at http://www.coinbooks.org/ There is a membership application available on the web site. To join, print the application and return it with your check to the address printed on the application. For those without web access, contact Dave Hirt, NBS Secretary-Treasurer, 5911 Quinn Orchard Road, Frederick, MD 21704 (To be removed from this mailing list write to me at whomren@coinlibrary.com)
