I am doing some research on a Dr. John E. Wilkison and recently purchased at auction his copy of the 1953 Palace Collections Catalog inscribed to him by R. Green of Sotheby's. It has what I assume are his personal marks and notations probably written during the auction. I happened to notice David Akers either auctioned off his holdings or purchased them outright. I was wondering if anyone knows anything about the Doctor.

Regarding Jeffrey LaPlante's question about Dr. John E. Wilkison, he was a collector from Springfield, Tennessee who amassed a fabulous gold pattern collection over a period of three decades, which was purchased by Paramount in September 1973.

David Akers, who worked at Paramount at that time, based his excellent reference United States Gold Patterns on Dr. Wilkison's collection. The collection was the most complete set of gold patterns ever acquired at that time, and it is doubtful that it will ever be equaled. I believe most of the coins were later purchased by A-Mark. It was probably Farouk's wonderful pattern collection that Wilkison was interested in.

Others are referring to the prominent Canadian collector Dr. John Wilkinson, with an "n" in his name. LaPlante was inquiring about Dr. John E. Wilkison, with no "n".

Some other items that may help:

1. R. Green was the business style of Chicago coin dealer Charles E. Green, after his wife Ruth. He started out as a dealer about 1935 and continued until his death in 1955, only a year or so after the Farouk sale. He published the booklet Mint Records of U.S. Coins 1793-1931 , Inclusive, which Louis Eliasberg used as a checklist to keep track of his collection. He never worked for Sotheby's as far as I know, so he must have sent Wilkison a copy of the sale that he obtained from somebody else, possibly just ordered the copy from Sotheby's.

2. Neither Wilkison nor Green actually attended the Farouk sale in Cairo. I believe the only Americans at the sale were John Jay Pittman, the Norwebs, Abe Kosoff and family, James Randal, Robert Schermerhorn, Gaston DiBello, Sol Kaplan and his wife, and Paul Wittlin.

Hans Schulman, who was born in Amsterdam but emigrated to America in 1939, was also there, and David Spink was on hand representing several clients, including the Norwebs.

The notes in the catalog must be observations Wilkison made at home, or perhaps he acquired a sales-room copy from someone who was actually there. MANY of the coins in his collection were pedigreed to Farouk, so he undoubtedly participated in the sale in a big way. Probably one of the American coin dealers acted as his agent.

David Akers book on gold patterns is a must for anyone interested in Wilkison or gold patterns in general. It was published in 1975 I think, and has been out of print for some time, but it is not very expensive and can often be found through the offerings of numismatic literature dealers or on eBay. I highly recommend it

The following website will provide the history and the complete listing of Dr. Wilkison's unique collection of United States Gold Patterns: www.pcgs.com/setregistry/alltimeset.aspx?s=22286

Several of his patterns were obtained from the famous Palace (Farouk) Collection held in Cario in1954. The book by David Akers "United States Gold Patterns" published in 1975 is a complete listing, but more important is the photography showing the beauty in color of these gold coins.