BOOK REVIEW: TRUTH SEEKER: LIFE OF ERIC P. NEWMAN

TRUTH SEEKER: THE LIFE OF ERIC P. NEWMAN

This new book, written by Leonard Augsburger, Roger Burdette and Joel Orosz and edited by James Halperin, tells the story of the first 104 years of Eric Newman’s remarkable life and numismatic history. Specialists in half and large cents might not be familiar with the huge footprint Newman has left on earlier American copper coinage. In a single decade from the late 1940s to the late 1950s, he produced not one or two, but THREE definitive works in the field: Varieties of the Fugio Cent (1949), Coinage for Colonial Virginia (1949), and The Secret of the Good Samaritan Shilling (1959). In 1967 he produced The Early Paper Money of America, still in print, still the definitive reference on the subject, and now in its 5th edition. With Ken Bressett, he authored The Fantastic 1804 Dollar in 1962, demonstrating once and for all that even the “original” 1804 dollars are fantasy pieces struck much later than the date they carry. EACers should all be familiar with his incredible collections that have been offered at auction over the past several years, including a significant part of the “Missouri Cabinet,” the finest collection of half cents ever auctioned. EAC members who were lucky enough to attend the 2007 convention in St. Louis were treated to an early look at Newman’s Money Museum on the campus of Washington University.

The story begins with his early life, including meeting Evelyn, who would be the love of his life and his wife from 1939-2015 when she passed away at 95. He worked as a lawyer for the Edison Brothers Stores until his retirement in 1987, and he continues to be active in numismatics at [105] years young. The book chronicles his interactions with a number of famous numismatists, including Wayte Raymond, F.C.C. Boyd, John J. Ford, Jr., Q. David Bowers, Walter Breen, Don Taxay, George Fuld, Kenneth Bressett, John W. Adams, and many others.

As a young lawyer, he came under the wing of St. Louis coin dealer Burdette Johnson. Together, they worked out an “arrangement” to purchase as much of the numismatic estate of “Col.” E.H.R. Green as they could. It’s a fascinating story, and I won’t give it away, how a young lawyer managed to put together at little cost one of the finest collections of American coins and currency ever assembled. Do you want to know EXACTLY when the Missouri Cabinet got its start? It’s in there. Newman’s involvement in that cabinet was kept so quiet that even McCawley and Grellman didn’t know about it until the day the collection was consigned to them for auction!

Newman’s fame in the broader field of U.S. numismatics comes from his application of a more rigorous, scholarly and scientific approach than had been previously known in numismatic research. He relied on contemporary documentation, for sure, but mostly he studied the coins and other items to find out what they, themselves, could tell him. His early research proved that both the Good Samaritan Shilling and the 1804 U.S. dollar were fantasy pieces. (Newman never owned an 1804 dollar, because he wanted to collect only genuine coins.) Later he had a severe falling-out with his former friend, the coin dealer John J. Ford, Jr., who had quite a business in the ‘50s and ‘60s selling previously unknown gold bars that were purported to come from old Mexico and the American west, most of which Newman denounced as fakes. Decades later, the courts agreed with Newman, finding that they were instead produced on Long Island in the 20th century. You will probably be amazed at the names of the prominent numismatists of the time who had significant financial interests in these fakes.

I think Augsburger et al. titled the book Truth Seeker because that’s what Eric Newman is. His ethics are impeccable. He follows the evidence where it goes and, remarkably, has never had a financial interest in any of his research. He has given away his entire collection to the Eric P. Newman Numismatic Education Society foundation for the education of numismatists of today and tomorrow. His quest for truth and ethics was not limited to numismatics, either. In 1961, as President of the A.N.A., he wrote the Biltmore Hotel in Atlanta that he would not be participating in the ANA convention if African-American members would not be served at the banquet. The hotel relented. He continues to be an inspiration to us all, and this book does him credit.

Eric Newman remains a current EAC member, with number 2577.

For more information about Early American Coppers, see:
http://eacs.org/

Wayne Homren, Editor

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