WAYNE'S NUMISMATIC DIARY: APRIL 17, 2016

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V19 2016 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 19, Number 16, April 17, 2016, Article 21

Tuesday April 12, 2016 was the regular meeting of my Northern Virginia numismatic social group, Nummis Nova. I arrived at the Da Domenico restaurant in McLean around 6 pm. Eric Schena was already waiting in the parking lot, and we entered together and took our seats.

April 12th being the date in 1861 when the Civil War began (as Confederate troops fired on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor), I'd suggested a Civil War theme. I'd brought with me a binder of ephemera relating to Civil War numismatics and set it out for display on a spare table at the far end of our room.

I also brought along some souvenirs of the 2016 ANS Gala, a manuscript of Dick Johnson's Encyclopedia of Coin and Medal Technology,and for no particular reason, a copy of Hey Mister Horn Blower, the autobiography of numismatic author Gene Hessler.

In my view the blockbuster display of the evening was brought by Joe Esposito - fibers from the rope by which militant abolitionist John Brown was hanged, in Charles Town, Virginia on December 2, 1859.

Our host for the evening was Joe Levine. Other attendees included Ron Abler, Julian Leidman, Steve Bishop, Jon Radel, Dave Schenkman, Wayne Herndon, Howard Daniel and my guest Robert Hoppensteadt. Roger Burdette was there for a bit until a snotty waiter rubbed him the wrong way. We missed him, but the rest of us stayed for the numismatic fellowship. The food wasn't bad, though it was overpriced and the waiters were indeed a unique experience.

Gene tapped his glass to get everyone's attention, then made a show of presenting a gift to Julian. Mentioning the Oreo Cookies Julian kept in his shop for visitors, Gene delivered the 1988 Oreo Triathalon medal described in my January 2016 Diary. 5,000 of the 24kt gold plated medals were produced in a marketing promotion.

Topics at my section of the table included our recent dinner at the Whitman Baltimore coin show, planning for the kids event at the upcoming June Annandale, VA coin show, the Newman Numismatic Portal (and adding more numismatic material to it), and updating the Virginia Obsolete Paper Money books.

Numismatic exhibits were relatively thin this month, but included a couple nice ancient coins from Thrace brought by Robert, and some medals shown by Steve Bishop - see the next article for more details on those.

This coin is from Philippopolis in Thrace. It is a 19mm bronze weighing 3.23 grams struck for the emperor Caracalla, with his young portrait on the obverse and what has been tentatively identified as the temple of Dionysus on the reverse set on a hill top with a grove of trees below. It was struck between 198 and 217 ad, probably on the early side based on the portrait

This coin was struck in the Thracian town of Deultum, a town made up of retired and settled Roman legionairies. The coins, while struck in Greece, are interesting in that they have Latin inscriptions. The bronze coin, struck between 244 and 249, is very small, 16 mm and 2.76 grams. The obverse has a portrait of Philip I (also know as Philkip the Arab) and the reverse has some controversy. One group thinks the large object is an ancient beehive, another thinks it is a fountain, a replica of the Mons Sudans that was outside the Colosseum in Rome and another thinks it is a cult object related to the temple shown at the base. It is difficult to know, certainly the people who used these coins in their daily transactions in that city would have known exactly what it meant.

Dave Schenkman had this U.S. Mint produced medal for the June 1864 Great Central Fair in Philadelphia as well as an accompanying Season Ticket. The event was a fundraiser for wounded Union soldiers.

The medal is a US Mint product (CM-44 in Julian). Four were struck in silver and 901 in bronze. The engraver was Anthony Paquet. Joe Levine commented that the card was probably a lot rarer than the medal.

I hated to leave but eventually it was time. I still had a half-hour drive home and emails to catch up on. I packed up my display material and said my goodbyes. It was another great evening of numismatic camaraderie, but the non-numismatic world was ready to suck me back in. 'Til next month!

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