OROSZ HIGHLIGHTS E-SYLUM HISTORY

"Anybody here have email?"

It would be surprising if, in 2012, any working-age person would fail to answer "yes" to this question.

Twenty years ago, however, when Numismatic Bibliomania Society member Wayne Homren began asking that of his fellow NBS members, hardly anyone responded. The Internet was second nature to Wayne, for he had been using it since 1980, when he had started working at Bell Labs.

Finally, in August of 1998, at the NBS annual meeting in Portland, Ore., a dozen hands went up, and Wayne sniffed opportunity. He envisioned an electronic newsletter that could keep NBS members in contact with each other between appearances of their quarterly print journal, The Asylum.

Accordingly, on the morning of Sept. 4, 1998, the NBS's inaugural email publication was sent to 49 wired members. It didn't have a name at first. Wayne wanted to call it The Babbler - that being what people in an asylum are wont to do - but NBS Board members liked his second choice, The E-Sylum, suggesting an electronic version of The Asylum.

By any name, The E-Sylum was a hit. Only a few hours after its first inbox appearance, the roster of subscribers grew to 59: an increase of more than 20 percent in a single day! The list quadrupled during the next six years, in the process outstripping the membership of the NBS. Today, more than 1,500 E-Sylumites scattered around the world eagerly await the lengthening shadows of Sunday evening, when the latest version, still edited by its founder, pings into the email inbox.

To read the complete article, see: Wayne's world: E-Sylum an instant hit (www.coinworld.com/articles/waynes-world/)

Wayne Homren, Editor

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