NEW PRESENTATIONS ADDED TO NUMISTORICA.COM

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V18 2015 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 18, Number 44, November 1, 2015, Article 42

Earlier this month while I was working on the 'Back to the Future' E-Sylum articles, I felt like I had a time machine of my own when I walked into the local Home Depot and saw rows and rows of Christmas trees and merchandise. ????? Uh, it's not even Halloween, guys. I left quickly.

But there's nothing wrong with preparing for the season. Bob Korver has prepared two Christmas-themed presentations among a group of four new features on his web site, Numistorica. He forwarded this press release. Thanks! -Editor

“NumiStorica.com was created to provide free entertainment and education for coin clubs and advanced numismatists, and I have just added a show on ‘Santa Claus on Obsolete Notes’ in time for the Holiday Season” noted numismatic story-teller Bob Korver.

Four new ‘slide shows’ for coin club presentations and advanced numismatists have just been posted. “The new shows are broken into smaller “PDF” files for posting, but anyone — or any club — who contacts me can obtain a disk with the complete QuickTime movie version, a complete PDF version, or the original Apple Keynote version.

“YES, VIRGINIA, There Is Very Definitely A SANTA CLAUS IN NUMISMATICS” (30 minutes) explores the Santa vignettes found on the Obsolete Notes of the Durand Collection. The place of these images in the standardization of the Santa persona — a 19th century American phenomena — is detailed, as well as a short history of what is now the world’s favorite religious and secular Winter Holiday.

“CERES, Goddess of Agriculture: From Roman Coins to American Obsolete Currency!” (50 minutes) covers a wide range of numismatics — some two centuries. I look at Roman coins for attributes that distinguish Ceres, and then search for these symbols on American Obsolete notes. Do these notes depict Ceres? Pioneer Woman? Both? Includes a civilized discussion on the symbolic role of bared breasts in art, both for real women and real goddesses. This is two slide shows in one; the question arises how many women is ‘Ceres’?

“LIFE IMITATING ART (Or Something Very Much Like That!)” (15 minutes) is only modestly numismatic, but it touches on a key concept in our hobby. We say that Numismatic Art reflects the values of its producing society. But what happens when Life is based on artistic fantasy? Reader feedback will be critical on this topic. And maybe it will change the way you look at some of the world around you. Certainly Disney Dollars.

"Major George Armistead & America's Star-Spangled Banner" (20 minutes) recently won a First Place Award from the North Texas Business Council for the Arts. This presentation is about genealogy and teaching family history to a new generation. It helps to have family connections to the original Star-Spangled Banner and to the Spot/Spoot tokens; but every family has ties that can make the past vibrant, and numismatics can be an important part of that process.

These four new presentations join the previous three that helped the NumiStorica.com website win the coveted “Best Non-Commercial Website of 2015” award from the Numismatic Literary Guild at the Chicago ANA (for which I am incredibly appreciative).