No problems with the storm. Predictions were that Ike would pass over Dallas, but it actually went quite a bit east of us, through the Tyler, Texas area. In Dallas, we had winds no greater than about 30 mph, and very little rain.

Perhaps no other author is in a better position to explore American coinage than Richard Doty, senior curator of numismatics at the National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution. In this position Doty maintains the nation.s collections of U.S. and world coins, tokens, medals, and paper and other money.more than 1.6 million objects ranging from ancient silver to modern-day credit cards. Formerly a professor of U.S., Latin American, and world history, Doty has authored and edited numerous books, and written more than 250 articles and radio scripts concerning numismatics.

With a professor.s knowledge and a raconteur.s wit, Doty weaves a tale that stretches from Europe to the New World, from pre-colonial days to the modern era. Why were Pine Tree Shillings minted? Why were Mexican silver dollars more common north of the border than U.S. dollars, even long after the Philadelphia Mint got underway? Why was tobacco once used as money (and why did that system go up in smoke)? Why has war brought such dramatic changes to our money? The territory is immense, and Doty is an able and companionable guide.

Hundreds of books have been written about American coins, and thousands on American history. Rarely do the two subjects meet. While coins, tokens, and paper money are part of the chronicle of our country, usually numismatic books don.t delve deep into American history. Conversely, American history books seldom discuss money. This very curious gap is elegantly bridged by America.s Money, America.s Story.

It's a completely new edition. The first edition was about 30,000 words while the second is about 70,000 words. The first edition stopped with data on the 19th State where the new book actually has most of the designs through the 5 insular territories and Washington, D.C. It has a lot of original research and of course is written from my point of view.

The newsreel footage covering the story, from 1935, is now posted at treasureinthecellar.com (click on "newsreel footage"). For those following along in the book, the action here takes place at page 80 in the narrative.

Shown in the video is the facade of 132 S. Eden St., Baltimore, where the find was made, followed by the coins (notice the dilapidated condition of the container), and short statements by the two boys who disinterred this pot of gold. Running his fingers through the gold coins is possibly Harry O. Levin, attorney for the children, who is not shown in the footage but is known to have been present at the time of the filming.

Is this the first "video submission" to the E-Sylum??

Just a comment on book titles - professional library catalogers always use the title page as the authority for a book title, although there may be a reference to the spine, or dust jacket title in the cataloging record. Obviously, in addition to marketing, the book title may simply be too long to fit on the spine.

David Powell 's query about uncut signatures rang a little bell with me. I can't top his 140-year-old example, but it reminded me of a comment I had made in an article published in our print journal -- "Bibliomania through the Ages: Four Mini-Reviews" (The Asylum (Spring 2002), Vol. 20, No 2, pp. 59-61).

Referring to the 1930 revision of F. Sommer Merryweather's Bibliomania in the Middle Ages (originally published in 1849), I had written, "... the copy which this reviewer was privileged to read had been uncut from page 137 on. The knowledge that this was the first time in seventy years that these particular pages had been scanned elicited a feeling of reverence, if not awe, and provided impetus to the project of reviewing this book in The Asylum."

This example falls short by a factor of two of even matching Powell's example, but I thought he might be interested that other readers have had a similar reaction to such a find, and I will look forward to seeing new records set.

David Powell asks about uncut signatures in numismatic books. One item in my upcoming (Oct. 28) auction has him beat. The auction includes a completely unsophisticated copy of Ludovico Debiel's 1733 Utilitas rei numariae veteres. It's unbound, in original wraps, untrimmed and unopened.

The simplest definition would be to say that it refers to a publication that is in the same state as it was when the printer's job was finished. The sheets folded to make the signatures are uncut, edges are untrimmed. The book (if it is such) is unbound, generally in wraps (if 18th or 19th century). The signatures have been compiled into a book (they aren't loose), and the book is completed, but nothing further has been done.

In last week's issue there was a piece about uncut signatures in numismatic books. I have wondered about a similar issue as it pertains to many older numismatic auction catalogs. I have hundreds of auction catalogs from the 19th century that are essentially new and un-used and have no writing on them, such as the priced or annotated examples that are avidly pursued. These consist of both cut and uncut signatures. My guess would be that these are extra examples left over from the sale and only dispersed many years later to collectors. My question is: For the ones with uncut signatures, should I cut them open or leave them intact? When they are uncut, it is somewhat cumbersome to look at the lot descriptions or to search for items that were sold. Will it hurt or help the value of these catalogs in the future? Does it matter at all? Inquiring minds want to know!

I laughed so hard when I read this article in the latest issue. Then I suddenly stopped laughing because it occurs to me that I may have a problem...

I really enjoyed the "You might be if numismatic bibliophile if ..." comments, especially the one about the flash drives.

The pickiest numismatic literature collector I know was John Ford. As soon as the December issue of The Numismatist was published, I sent him a pristine set of the year's issues, carefully wrapped. This was after sending several individual issues during the year when I received irate phone calls describing what the Post Office had done to the current issue. In the end, it was easier to send the whole year at once for John's library.

Last week's E-Sylum announced a new book, Identification Discs of Union Soldiers in the Civil War. Does any one know if this book also touches upon the subject of personalized dog tags engraved on coins?

I'm also wondering if the book catalogues and pictures some of the always-unique Civil War ID tags made on individual silver coins and also the multi-part ID badges with hanger shields picturing Hooker, McClellan & the like, several of which sold in the John J. Ford Jr. Stack's sales.

The book catalogs die-struck discs but it also illustrates and describes suspended pieces, has pictures of a number of them, and even a number of pictures of soldiers wearing these suspended badges. It also illustrates a couple definitely home-made jobs.

One of the September 14th E-Sylum articles pertained to K.P. Austin of Salisbury, MD, who I knew years ago when he was in his 60's and 70's. K.P. frequently patronized the Lanham, MD coin shows, which were held several times a year. I remember him not as a coin collector, but as a paper money aficionado.

He was always accompanied by a woman, who was probably his personal secretary. Her responsibility was to carry a small black volume that contained a list of K.P.'s paper money holdings. K.P. was known to be very astute about paper, with experience gained long before the currently available references were published. K.P. was considered an 'old timer' 30 years ago.

I am researching the Eliasberg-Friend 1892-O Micro O half dollar, that J.M. Clapp purchased from Lyman H. Low in July 1903, probably at auction. If any reader has a copy of Low's July 1903 auction catalog, I would appreciate knowing the lot number and actual text of that particular coin. The Clapp Notebook indicates a purchase price of $2.25.

Four people responded to my request for information - thanks to Karl Moulton, David Hirt, Jim Neiswinter and David Fanning.

The 1892 micro-O half dollar that Mark Borchardt asks about is lot 969 in Low's July 15-16, 1903 auction, and did indeed sell for $2.25.

Byron Reed bought many of J.N.T. Levick's tokens, including his fantastic collection of sutler tokens. Levick went around to various Cincinnati minters and directly bought pieces from them, including many uncirculated examples of sutler tokens.

We have Reed's catalog showing prices realized from the one big Levick sale and Reed clearly won the majority of the lots. I believe Reed attended that particular sale in person and we can trace many of the lots to tokens in his collection, so there is a nice link there. More importantly, it means that much of the Levick token collection is still together as a unit.

I would also be happy to answer any inquiries as to which tokens are included as I do have a complete listing which I (and the city of Omaha) are willing to share.

Okay, I'll bite since no one else did. What's with the head cover and big grin in the picture of Levick? My guess is he is playing the wolf pretending to be grandmother in an off-the-charts version of Little Red Riding Hood. Am I close? Or do you really have to be numismatic bibliomaniac to figure it out?

Over the years, eBay has made more and more rules and more and more money. They have provided little to no assistance in the case of a fraudulent seller. Now, with the requirement for sellers to accept PayPal, they are adding to their income... again.

But for a small seller like me, they are not only taking more of my money, but also creating a new set of books for me to keep. Since I claim all of my eBay sales, using PayPal gives me another thing to do. One day, the federal government will determine that eBay is a monopoly and act accordingly.

I find the transparency of eBay's actions quite disturbing. The company claims that this is being done to protect customers, but it all too obvious that it is just a revenue-enhancement gimmick for eBay, which owns PayPal. Since PayPal extracts a fee for its services, an item has to sell for something over its actual cost to me before I can break even. I buy and sell coin boards, folders and albums on eBay, and there are always a few customers, mostly the elderly, who still send checks or money orders. I suppose these customers will be lost, though in fact they constitute a minority of my buyers. Most, like me, enjoy the convenience of PayPal, but its use should remain optional at the discretion of buyer and seller.

Another disturbing move is that eBay keeps dropping hints that it may require sellers to offer free shipping. I see this as a means to extract yet more money from sellers. eBay doesn't receive a percentage of the shipping fee, but by requiring free shipping it would force sellers to again charge more from the buyers to cover expenses, and such higher prices would result in larger fee collections by eBay and PayPal.

In the past year or two there have been so many changes in eBay's policies and functionality that it has become quite frustrating. There seem to have been a lot of changes made simply for the sake of change, and these have forced users to continually relearn something they'd already mastered. I've long been leery of software "upgrades" and similar, seemingly unnecessary changes, but these seem to be irresistable to website engineers and their management. I'm afraid that something that wasn't broken is being rendered nearly useless to me through such frequent "fixes." Am I simply a Luddite, or do others feel the same way?

Call out the National Guard or at least the ACLU as we're losing yet another Freedom! Now acting like Big Brother on the internet ~ yikes! What right do they have to do this? If every business started to follow this practice it would wipe it most yard sales, swap meets, coin shows, hot dog vendors and the guy that shines shoes at the airport. I'm afraid I'd need to pay the mortgage, pay the utilities or car payment and if something happened and it didn't get processed, I'd lose everything I own. With as many computer hackers stealing your social security number, military records, store and gas credit card numbers there are not enough safeguards to protect yourself from theft. I'm sure that many will start to use an auction company that is not so demanding. If everybody had to use an electronic card it would force the BEP and U.S. Mint employees to find new jobs as well as those who issue checks and money orders. Good grief, Charlie Brown, it's almost scary being alive anymore!

With respect to Eric Holcomb's observation that eBay will soon require all sellers to take only Paypal or other electronic forms of payment: I just read an article advising of the same thing in the APIC's Political Bandwagon. That article stated that eBay sellers are not compelled to take that form of electronic payment exclusively and can, with alternative payment choices stated in their listings, take checks and money orders...or cash for that matter. More often than not, since I don't have Paypal, I've emailed a seller who states in his listing "Paypal only" , asking if a postal money order is acceptable and that I don't have Paypal. Almost always, the seller replies "yes".

It is also apparently true that new eBay registered sellers , who had been totally unregistered with eBay before even as bidders/buyers, are being required to sign up for Paypal. But "older" eBay sellers , even if they'd only been previously buyers, can remain Paypal-free. In other words, I've been registered with eBay as a buyer/bidder since 1998 but have never yet sold anything on eBay. It is my understanding that if I registered sometime in the future as a seller too, I will not be required to accept Paypal. True?

Perhaps an E-Sylum reader who is an experienced eBay seller can straighten out all this confusion. Because if what people are hearing about eBay's soon-to-be -enforced electronic payment requirement is true, this will significantly impact numismatics. Many buyers do not want Paypal and prefer checks, money orders or cash. As it is, I believe starting in January there will no longer be eBay live numismatic auctions ? Is that true? I've seen that in print more than once.

Ya know, all this electronic requirement payment brouhaha sounds suspiciously of violation of anti-trust laws since eBay owns Paypal. Maybe Congress, if they can redirect their attentions from the "important business" they handle (said with tongue- in- cheek), they might investigate this new eBay policy. If nothing else, it is certainly illegal restraint of trade, a federal issue.

Having just written about Lord Nelson for a future Coin World feature, I'd have to say he is featured prominently on dozens and dozens of coins and medals, mostly medals, and even a bank note.

As for coins, Queen Elizabeth II has to be tops, if not Lincoln, given the sheer volume of coins depicting her.

An aside, The Numismatist in 1957 ran a multi-page article about Lafayette medals. He's certainly among the most honored, as is Lindbergh. Speaking of Lucky Lindy, the Missouri Historical Society has a great collection of Lindbergh's items, including dozens and dozens of medals bestowed to him. I visited the exhibit in May when I went home, and I could visit it again and again - beautiful pieces.

"The Private Mint of Clark, Gruber and Company" was the name of an episode on what popular television show? (No fair Googling the answer)!

• The Rifleman
• Death Valley Days
• Bonanza
• Hee-Haw

The first is the one everyone has seen - with the bowler hat & prince nez glasses.

Is it true the ANS Hispanic collection is only worth $30?

ANS made $6 million by moving (twice) but lost a $30 collection because they moved.

Most of these are found on coins from the mid-18th century. This example on an 1833 dime is one of the earliest dated United States coins known with this stamp.

... it requires about three days to deposit enough medal, say a 1/16th inch, to give the electroform enough strength so it won't malform.

Who are these people? See what a little hyphen can do between E-Sylum and Esylum. I found : The Esylum at http://theesylum.com

The song Ultrabeat - Esylum (i go crazy) is that our song? I had no idea we had a Chat Room

Here, they actually use the hyphen :

I found dozens of other web links and sites on Esylum. Is this a musical group? Do we own the domain?

We came across this site while researching the Bank of North America. This is an amazing site with many links that will help readers of The E-Sylum. We especially liked the link on United States denominations.