I bought Haxby when it was published, and hardly touched it (because I was still collecting Japan), so when the second edition was announced, I let Fred Schwan sell my set. Then the second edition never happened, and I started collecting counterfeits, of which there are thousands in Haxby. So I had to buy another set from one of our prominent book dealers - a set that was not as well cared for as mine had been. Grump.

I bought mine in July 1984 for $75. That is too long ago for me to remember who I bought it from. It is bound in a maroon buckram and came that way. I bought it to complete a bound set of The Numismatist that I bought at about that time.

The set included Vol. 4, Vol. 7 thru Vol. 16 and Vol. 18 thru Vol. 63. They are uniformly 3/4 bound in red and black buckram. It took me longer to find a copy of Vol. 17. Part of my problem was the fact that I had it in my mind that I was missing Vol. 27 (1915) and ended up with two extra sets of that year. Sometimes it doesn't pay to rely on your memory and not confirm the actuality.

... actual samples of California gold underneath two small Formica disks mounted on p.45.

When the 1850 Eckfeldt-Dubois book was published in 1850 Formica was not known. It was patented in 1913 as a substitute for mica and thus the name. Mica is a natural mineral that was used for many different purposes prior to the invention of plastics.