Sometime in the late 1980’s the Shelby County Coin Club here in Sidney Ohio invited John Queen to give a program on Canadian coins. He accepted, came up from Englewood, about 45 minutes drive, to one of our meetings and talked for about an hour, emphasizing how underrated uncirculated 19th and early 20th century Canadian coins were in higher grades. He told us about the fantastic Canadian collection Paramount International Coin Corp. had purchased and encouraged us to expand our horizons beyond US coinage.

Our meetings always featured a 25 to 50 lot coin auction (and they still do) and John offered to be the auctioneer for the evenings regular auction. It was quite a change to have a professional coin auctioneer do the calling, and the auction took a lot less time than normal. I recall that John was intense but personable and very willing to share his knowledge.

I worked with John Queen at Paramount International Coin Corporation in the early/mid1970's. John was a great guy who was very knowledgeable in many areas of numismatics but his first love was Canadian coinage. I believe John joined Paramount around/after the passing of Jim Kelly. Prior to working at Paramount, he was Pastor of a local church located in the Dayton area. His work at Paramount revolved around cataloguing auctions where he also served as the firm's auctioneer.

Sometime in the mid-1970's, he left Paramount to start his own coin company, Royal Enterprises located in West Milton, OH. After a few years, he returned very briefly to work again at Paramount. Around 1980, he joined the Peace Corps and served for some time in South America (I believe Ecuador). Later, he returned to Southern Ohio where he went back into the ministry and resumed his coin dealings. I understand the money he earned dealing in coins during this time was used to support his ministry working with the poor in depressed areas of Southeast Ohio.

In February, 2017, I received an email from his wife, Linda advising that they would be traveling through Kentucky and wanted to know if I would meet them along I-75 for lunch? Of course, I accepted the invitation. I had not seen John in at least a quarter century. We had a nice lunch meeting where we discussed all the "old times" at Paramount. He was 93 or 94 at the time and was as sharp as I always remembered him. I have attached a photo I took at that February, 2017 meeting here in Lexington, KY.

This put me in mind of our (non-) circulating "gold" dollars, Sacagawea & the Presidents. They look good when you first get them, but use them for a short while & they become distinctly shabby. They're the coin equivalent of teenage slang, yo!

Though I wasn't at the ANA convention, an extension of me was. As the Numismatic Literary Guild's Award Coordinator I was determined to reinstate the ritual of presenting the winner of the Ribbit Award not just a plaque but also the figurine that seems to have disappeared some years ago. This is a Chinese frog with a cash coin in its mouth, and it plays some role in bringing good fortune, so I purchased a replacement on eBay. Ideally, last year's winner of the Ribbit, Don Willis, would then present it to the new recipient, Ron Guth.

I put the boxed figurine in one of NGC's show crates with instructions to our crew that someone from the NLG would come by the booth to pick it up. That person, who shall remain nameless, failed to do so, and the frog was shipped with the rest of NGC's supplies to our next show in Dallas. I then tried to have it continue on to the Long Beach show, where I knew Ron Guth would be in attendance. Sadly, the frog was returned to NGC, arriving here during that show. Good luck is finally shining upon the winner, as it has since been shipped directly to Ron, who will bring it to the Pittsburgh gathering next year.