Volume II, Number 1 of The Asylum (Spring 1982) included an article by Robert I. Wester on S.S. Crosby’s family. In that article, he makes the following statement: “Of all the coins in Sylvester’s cabinet he perhaps prized most the 1783 1000 Mill Pattern Dollar which appears, embossed in gilt, on the cover of the morocco-bound presentation advance copy of The Early Coins of America.” Dave Bowers had an article in the March 2015 issue of The Numismatist. This early U.S. pattern coinage in which he traces the provenance of the unique pattern mark (1,000 units piece). Crosby is not brought up.

My Dad, Carl Rosenblum, was both a numismatist and a chess-player (and chess teacher). For about 20 to 25 years Dad ran W. P. Andrews Co., Inc. First based in West Orange, NJ and later Southbury, CT the company specialized In Israeli numismatics as well as US coins. He set up under W.P. Andrews at many (now defunct) NYC shows as well as other shows in the Garden State and had a world-wide mail order business for Israeli coins. He also was an avid chess player although I have no idea what his ranking was.

When he moved to Southbury in the late 1980s he began to volunteer to teach chess to grade school students throughout the Southbury area. He continued to do this until he was 94 or so when the spirit was still willing but driving the roads of rural Connecticut was too much for him. But he continued to love chess.

I spoke to him on the phone the day before he passed away. He was in a Waterbury, CT hospital and I was unable to leave snow-bound Colorado to see him. I asked him how he was feeling and he said "fine" (He always said fine) but he was bored, "there was nobody to play chess with".

Did you know they sell coins on Amazon? I never even bothered to look, but here's an item that may prove irresistible...

I mean, free shipping? How can you NOT buy it?