I think we finally have something that will replace Sylvester S. Crosby’s Early American Coins—in spades!

In Nevada, for a time, the lawyer, the editor, the banker, the chief desperado, the chief gambler, and the saloon keeper occupied the same level of society, and it was the highest. The cheapest and easiest way to become an influential man and be looked up to by the community at large was to stand behind a bar, wear a cluster-diamond pin, and sell whiskey. I am not sure but that the saloonkeeper held a higher rank than any other member in society. His opinion had weight. It was a privilege to say how the elections should go. No great movement could succeed without the countenance and direction of the saloonkeeper.

I have been a coin collector all my life. In early 2002 I started collecting tokens. I wrote a book on Costa Rican coffee tokens.

The Third Edition of Doug Winter's book Gold Coins of the Charlotte Mint is a masterpiece from an author who has already demonstrated his expertise on 19th century United States gold coinage on numerous occasions. This new edition is a much-needed improvement to Winter's earlier works on Charlotte Mint gold, with revised population data, rarity estimates, Condition Census information and die variety diagnostics. A definitive study that belongs in the library of all serious numismatic researchers and Southern gold experts.

The article in January 19th E-Sylum on Obama Inaugural Medal Designer Daniel Altshuler said a team of sculptors was selected to design the Obama medal. A check of the official web site for inaugural memorabilia shows that it gives credit only to Mark Mellon.

I don't know of any issued inaugural medal that Daniel Altshuler designed. Perhaps the title should have been "Article Interviews Medal Designer Daniel Altshuler."

The reverse of the official medal is by Thomas Rogers (not Marc Mellon) in spite of the inaugural committee website not giving Tom (designer of the Sacagawea dollar) credit for his design.

The Wikipedia entry for Paul Felix Armand-Delille, a French professor who accidentally killed 98% of the rabbits in Europe during the 1950s, says "Armand-Delille found himself both condemned by rabbit hunters and showered with praise by farmers and foresters. Prosecuted, in January 1955 he was convicted and fined 5000 francs; and honored, in June 1956 he was awarded a gold medal to commemorate his achievement by Bernard Dufay, honorary director-general of the French Department of Rivers and Forests. The medal depicts Armand-Delille on one side, and a dead rabbit on the other."

I was wondering if anyone has a picture of the medal - I couldn't locate one. Thanks.

Whitman Publishing is creating a "Vault" book similar in format to this one - Obama Vault Book - but focusing specifically on President Obama's inauguration. A Whitman "Vault" book includes replicas of tickets, programs, bumper stickers, posters, and other ephemera and memorabilia, tucked into its pages. If any E-Sylum readers have numismatic or exonumic souvenirs of the inauguration that they'd like to share for possible publication, please contact publisher Dennis Tucker at dennis.tucker@whitmanbooks.com or 404-235-5348.

Examples might include medals, tokens, scrip, or even commemorative Metro passes, phone cards, or similar --- I'll let the reader define "numismatic" and "exonumia"! Souvenirs from the days leading up to the inauguration (e.g., from the Inaugural Train trip) or following (e.g., from the inaugural balls and celebrations) are also welcome.

I am emailing you on behalf of a friend to determine what this item is. What he has is a carved, etched reverse of a Morgan Silver dollar on some sort of plaster or clay stone and it is considerably larger than the original coin. It appears to be a period piece and has damage to the image (it looks like someone was trying to destroy it by putting a slash through it.)

It is original and has the sculptors’ original measurement markings. It appears to be an galvano. Is there are market for items like these? Any assistance is greatly appreciated!

Since the attached image was scanned and not photographed, you can explode to very close magnification to see the fine detail in the engraving relief and the ink/ paint work that was applied. The ink lines had to be applied by hand as the ink would have filled the small cracks of the relief if it had been put on by a brush.

When you look closely at the talon, head and wing areas of the eagle, you can see the great attention someone took to detail to even the smallest points of the engraving and to the design. I would think that this was not done by someone just wanting to use it as a picture of sorts, but someone who was trying to show what the conceptual design would look like down to the finest detail.

The engravers layout marks in the corners for size. The design is exactly 6 inches in diameter measured from the outer most ink circle. An actual Morgan dollar is 1.5 inches across so this would make the design exactly a 4:1 ratio of the coin.

The entire piece measures approximately 6 and 3/8 inches wide by approx. over 8 1/2 inches tall. It is over 2 inches thick and weighs approximately 3-5 lbs (or more as it has never been weighed yet)

The indentation mark at the south right corner is a thumbprint in the medium. There are finger impressions (not shown) all along the top edge of the piece. It is if someone pressed (or poured?) in into a mold then pulled it out of the mold then applying the ink medium over the engraving.

My feeling is that it is part of the mint process. I forwarded the image to Michael Fey, and he thought that it looked OK as well. One of the reasons that I think it is OK is because it is an 8 tail feather reverse. Michael said almost the same thing, except he referred to the parallel arrows. The only way to get an accurate value is to auction it and I told him that I would be happy to represent the owner in getting it properly placed.

I saw your article about my 2008 Hard Times Tokens. Thanks, I enjoyed reading it.

I just wanted to point out that it also has edge lettering which can be hard to see. At the top on the edge it says "Don't Borrow Money". At the bottom on the edge it says "Don't Pay Interest".

So who can supply a short history of the Society of Bearded Numismatists? I remember attending their "meetings" at the ANA conventions in the early 80's. At each meeting, someone was selected (I think by Jack Veffer and Grover Criswell) to be the new SOB of the year and received one of Dora's beautiful medals.

In general they were deserving individuals and I remember thinking I would love to have one of the medals, even at the cost of being selected to be "SOB of the Year". (Of course I was never close to being in the running.) The parties were generally in good fun and with a surfeit of liquid libation.

I was and still am an S.O.B. numismatist, holding the rank of stochastic actuary (I'm an actuary, "stochastic" refers to a random process, and I'm as random as the next guy). I was never named S.O.B. of the year, though, and thus never was awarded the medal.

I have the high honor and privilege to have received the "S.O.B. Of The Year" award in 1981, and wore it to every ANA convention that I attended after that. My good friend David T. Alexander has one, and my former fellow authenticator at ANACS, Ingrid Smith, has one of the very limited number (two?) made in silver!

I was so pleased to see your recognition of the RCNA article about Dora DePedery-Hunt. I was especially interested in the illustration and commentary about the S.O.B. medal. Yes, I am a proud member of the SOB fraternity.

Jack, I and our wives had been friends for some years since I had served under him as a CNA executive representing the Eastern USA. Although the SOB's were originally to be all bearded, I came on board just because Jack and my wife both agreed that I was a true S O B, and thus eligible. Although clean shaved, I became a member when, unknown to me, my wife gave Jack a generous donation (called bribery) and had me initiated as a full time, medal wearing member at an annual CNA convention. Those were fun years. I still proudly wear my medal whenever I am fortunate enough to be able to attend the annual RCNA conventions.

Non-bearded numismatists could join the Society of Bearded Numismatists by paying a surcharge on the entrance fee. As I recall, dues were $100 one time, payable to the C Douglas Ferguson Foundation in Canada. I don't remember what the surcharge was.

I joined (beardless, per Army policy) about 1980 or 81. Each member took a title- Mine was Shogun. I remember Denis Loring was Stochastic Actuary and Ingrid Smith was Beard Inspector. Veffer and Criswell were each Half-President for Life (and may have had other titles as well).

The society's uniform was a yellow t-shirt decorated with one's title. The de Pedery-Hunt badge was not obtained by joining. One badge was given each year to whomever the current holders thought deserved to receive it. I believe I received the last one awarded, at Atlanta in 1987. Most are bronze, as illustrated in The E-Sylum. At least three were silver - Grover's, Jacks' and Yasha Beresiner's. The society faded away about the time the last badge was presented.

Regarding Pisanello's impresa, I think that here are much better analogs to trademarks, and they predate imprese: such are the merchants marks of Northern Europe, and of course coats of arms everywhere in Western Europe. Since the 14th c. goldsmiths and silversmiths were required by the statutes of their guilds to put their makers' marks on their works.

Mint marks for individual mint-masters, which appear roughly at the same time, are similar. Arguably their purpose was different. But the concept of trademark was more general, including its legal aspect.

The great jurist Bartolo, in his tract "de insignis et armis" (unfinished at his death in 1357), gives several examples of trademarks, such as the watermarks of paper-makers or marks of sword-makers, and explains why they ought to be considered as protected by law against counterfeiting, even discussing who owns the trademark when a partnership is dissolved. Going farther back, one finds trademarks imprinted on Roman bricks and amphorae by their producers.

Dick Johnson says that the trademark symbol is a T in a small circle. In fact, it is a small TM, or -- for registered trademarks, an R in a small circle ®.

Regarding Dick Johnson's call for the American Numismatic association to go back to the Lamp of Knowledge logo, I call the readers' attentions to the ANA press release on this subject, distributed 18 June 2008.

I just read Jared Dawber’s comment on First Man in Rome in the latest E-Sylum – actually McCullough is right – the first appearance of the sestertius as a coin was in silver and it was quite small – valued at 2.5 asses or 1/2 a quinarius or 1/4 denarius. The coins were only issued from 211 – 206 BC.

The brass sestertius that Jared refers to and that most of us are familiar with was not introduced until the time of Augustus (around 18 BC). So for the time period which the First Man in Rome discusses, McCullough is perfectly correct – in fact I am very surprised and impressed that she caught a numismatic detail that most numismatists, even those who collect Roman coins, would miss. Yet another reason why the First Man in Rome series is one of my favorite historical novels!"

Mudd is correct that the Roman silver sestertius was first struck c. 211-206 BC. However, it was not "only" issued during that period. It was revived in 91-85 BC by 2 or possibly 3 moneyers. It then disappeared for another 40 years, but was again revived during the period 48-44 BC (the period of McCullough's book), and struck by 12 moneyers. All of these sestertii are scarce or rare, so they were probably not economically significant, but during the Republic and early Empire, the sestertius was widely used for designating sums of money. The sestertius finally became a bronze coin c.38 BC, as part of Antony's fleet coinage.

Douglas Mudd is mistaken that silver sestertii were only issued from 211-206 B.C. See H. A. Seaby, Roman Silver Coins, Vol. I, The Republic to Augustus. Silver sestertii are listed on pp. 3, 7, 12 (44 B.C.), 15 (46 B.C.), 25 (90-89 B.C.), and many other pages.

“Ms Plouviez said their value when in circulation had been estimated at a modern equivalent of between £500,000 and £1m, but they were likely to be worth less than that now."

I think that a $100 trillion Zimbabwe banknote would be quite a collector's item. Do you know of anyone selling them?

The editorial page from the UK's Coin News describes the finding of an undated mule 20 pence coin - created by matching an old style 2008 obverse with a new style 2008 reverse. In theory this should be the only possible undated mule as the 20 pence was the only coin in the redesigned set to have moved the date from one side to the other.

However, there is still the possibly of dated mules appearing as all "old style" coins had a beaded obverse and the new coins have an unbeaded obverse. It seems probable that all denominations have been struck in both old and new styles so it gives collectors a lot more to look out for.

The medals included in this article fall into different categories: some are obviously designed to propagandize their point, while others more subtly promote, and by inference denigrate, one religion over another, or indeed suggest the superiority of any religious practice over non-religious or secular practices.

The subtle ones sometimes are more effective, and therefore more dangerous, as the observer is not as likely to be aware of how he/she is being manipulated to support the views of the artist. Another category of medals shown here do not promote religious bigotry directly, if at all, but rather are included in this article to illustrate and amplify further the history of the period discussed, particularly as it involves conflicts and wars based on religious differences between the parties involved.

ANTI-SEMITIC MEDALS: While prejudice among the various religious groups exists among them all to varying degrees, over the ages bigoted acts against the Jews have been among the most prevalent, severe, and unrelenting. History has shown that Jews, while welcomed in times of need, often were maligned, periodically expelled from their native lands, and sometimes even subjected to mass murder. Some of this bigotry is reflected in the issuance of medals purposefully designed to vilify the Jewish community.

Anti-Semitic medals are probably the most common and most notorious medals for spreading religious hatred, a topic that has been considered in some detail by Daniel Friedenberg in his book Jewish Medals: From the Renaissance to the Fall of Napoleon (1503-1815).