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QUERY: WHAT IS A SAMMY MARKS PENNY?Dick Johnson forwarded the following item asking, What is a Sammy Marks Penny? With over 15 year's industry experience, South Cape Coins have long been considered one of South Africa's premier rare coin dealers. So when they launched their first rare coin competition in July earlier this year, there was immediate interest from local and international numismatic communities as well as South Cape Coin's existing customers and Facebook followers. The competition prize was an incredibly rare 1898 Sammy Marks Penny, graded MS64 RB by independent coin grading company PCGS and valued at an astounding R45 000.
To read the complete article, see:
R 45,000 Rare Coin Competition Giveaway
(pressportal.co.za/business-and-economy/item
I'd never heard of these either, but an Internet search found a clue.
-Editor
And here's a photo of the 1898 Sammy Marks Penny that could be yours! 
To read the complete article, see: WIN! 1898 Sammy Marks Penny MS64 RB (www.cointalk.com/t181471/)
So the prize is a South African penny "from the Sammy Marks collection".
So who's Sammy Marks? It turns out Wikipedia had an answer.
-Editor
Marks contributed generously to Jewish communities all over South Africa. The Pretoria synagogue was built in 1898, for which he donated all the bricks and paid for the electric light installation and chandeliers. At the end of the Anglo-Boer War, he presented a cast-iron fountain to the city of Pretoria, shipped from Glasgow and very Edwardian in design, it stands at the Zoological Gardens. Marks commissioned the statue of Kruger on Church Square in Pretoria - sculpted by Anton van Wouw and cast in bronze in Europe, it carried a price tag of ₤10 000.
So now we know what a Sammy Marks tickey is. Did he also mint pennies at the state mint? Further searching led back the South Cape Coins.
-Editor
... in gratitude of his support of the Government and strong friendship with President Kruger, he was granted the opportunity of free use of the mint for a day, where he struck 215 gold Tickey's as mementos for his family, relatives and close friends. The 1898 Sammy Marks Penny, however, was not struck by Marks himself but rather ordered for his own private collection. In total 240 of these bronze pennies were minted. What makes these coins exceptionally remarkable is that the majority have remained preserved and untouched in their original packaging. In fact, Sammy Marks stated in his will of 1908 that the coins were not to be sold for 100 years, and so, in 2008 they were removed from the safe in their original mint bag. Only 210 of these coins have been graded with the Sammy Marks Pedigree on the capsule.
To read the complete article, see:
(www.southcapecoins.co.za/index.php/news
Interesting story! Thanks Dick, for bringing this to our attention.
-Editor
THE BOOK BAZARREWayne Homren, Editor The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
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