The E-Sylum:  Volume 11, Number 13, March 30, 2008, Article 9

TOKENS AND MEDALS GUIDE BOOK AUTHOR THANKS E-SYLUM COMMUNITY

Katie Jaeger writes: "Last week, Dennis Tucker announced my
upcoming Guide Book of United States Tokens and Medals and said,
'valuations editors [were] Steve Tanenbaum and Steve Hayden,
with assistance from Anthony Terranova, Paul Cunningham, and
others.'  I really wanted to make sure that Alan Weinberg's
assistance as valuations editor was also mentioned.  He did a
ton of work on this project.

"Come to think of it, probably half the members of this group
have helped me, one way or another, in the writing of this book!
It seemed OK that a beginner to exonumia (me) would write a book
for beginners to exonumia, but it meant I had a million questions
and had to seek expert advice countless times.  I did formal
telephone interviews with Joe Levine, David Gladfelter, and Cindy
Wibker. I called Dick Johnson probably 20 times, and we went on
a research trip together, to the Tiffany Archive in Parsippany,
New Jersey.  Dave Bowers, Russ Rulau, John Adams, Anne Bentley,
George Fuld and John Coffee were always a phone call or email away,
and always responded promptly to my queries -- what authors do this?
I hung out at Charlie McSorley’s table at the Allentown (PA) shows
for hours at a time, to catch earfuls of lore. Ditto John Burns,
at his table in Baltimore.

"The above-mentioned valuations editors, and many others, answered
countless questions across their show tables.  A dozen people read
the manuscript, or sections of it (among them Ken Bressett, Cliff
Mishler, Dave Bowers, Bob Julian, and Bob Leonard) and sat down to
write me point-by-point critiques.  Dozens more furnished medals,
tokens, and altered coins for photography.  Through Dave Bowers and
Vicken Yegparian at Stack’s, I was able to get my hands on those
fabulous images from the Ford sales, and the ANS allowed Tom Mulvaney
and me to come for three days last October, so Tom could shoot over
500 items from their collections. He shot hundreds more besides those,
and perfected each photo in his studio at home in Kentucky.
Thanks Tom!

"This has been a team effort all the way, and such a tremendous
learning experience for me.  Above all, I discovered that numismatists
are good, generous-hearted people who show patience and tolerance to
the newbie, and are willing share their own hard work and research,
asking nothing in return. (This is a far cry from the mainstream
historical research community.)  As I sit today reading the page
proofs, I realize I owe a huge debt of thanks to all of you, and to
everyone else named in the credits of the book.  I hope you all
know how much I value your help, and how much I enjoyed working
with you."

  Wayne Homren, Editor

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