HARVEY STACK ON THE HOLLAND SALE

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V24 2021 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 24, Number 11, March 14, 2021, Article 14

Last week we discussed the 1955 Pennypacker sale of the Ira Reed estate. An earlier article (linked in last week's issue) discussed the May 1959 Pennypacker sale of the Leonard M. Holland Large Cent collection. Harvey Stack was there and submitted this remembrance of the event. Thanks! First, here's the Kolbe & Fanning description of the sale from that earlier article. -Editor

The Pennypacker sale was a remarkable event, offering a fine collection of large cents assembled in the late 1940s and 1950s, mostly acquired from Leonard Holland's good friend Thomas Elder. Holland pledged the collection as collateral for a construction project loan in the late 1950s. He encountered unforeseen difficulties and the bank foreclosed the loan, choosing an obscure country auctioneer to liquidate the collection. Distribution of the catalogue was limited and the coins generally sold for low prices. Some of the important collectors of the day did not learn of the sale and several of the attendees funneled their bids through a single agent.

After the sale, it is reported that the coins were again auctioned within the group in a hotel room. Sometimes, the differences were dramatic, with coins subsequently bringing double or triple the original hammer price. Notables attending the sale included Ray Gallo, Louis Helfenstein, Dorothy Paschal, Gene Reale, C. Douglas Smith, Harvey Stack, Willard C. Blaisdell, Michael Kolman, Allen McDowell and Walter Breen.

Here are Harvey's recollections. -Editor

Shortly after a New York Numismatic Spring convention, a group of dealers and collectors ran off to the Pennypacker sale. A list of lots to be sold was distributed at the convention, and had enough information to attract quite a few.

My family saw the list, talked to a few specialized cent collectors, and they sent me to the sale. My folks thought if the coins were what were indicated in the listing, it would be worth a trip. Since a number of collectors and dealers were going, they felt that there could be a gang up by the buyers to "buy at bargain prices" some rare and unusual large cents. From my memory there were a few collectors who already banded together. I, as a known professional, was asked to go, and maybe be part of one of the groups that was going to work together.

My group included Louis Helfenstein, Gene Reale, C. Douglas Smith and Allen McDowell. One of the other groups included Ray Gallo, Dorothy Pascal (on behalf of Dr. Wm. Sheldon) and Walter Breen. A few independents were Willard C. Blaisdell, Michael Kolman (an Ohio Dealer) and a few unknown collectors.

The sale took place, each group worked with each other separately, but since I had Louis Helfenstein (a specialist collector) and C. Douglas Smith (a large cent specialist ) with me, we were able to properly mark our lots after we examined each coin, and decided that on many that we would buy them in tandem and then have a private auction after the sale. Our strength did outbid the others in most cases and our group captured most of the rarities and exceptionally choice examples.

Yes the other groups did participate, but they lacked what would they do if each wanted the same coin. They therefore dropped bidding on some. Our group captured most of the important lots, paid for them and then retired to a nearby hotel to auction among ourselves each lot we just acquired.

The idea was to have a starting price at the auction sale prices, and that we then could bid and make deals among ourselves what we were willing to pay, and the sale took place. As the only professional auctioneer in our group, I conducted the sale of each lot. Some sold for just a few bids above the "hammer price at the sale", others were bid on very competitively among our group and some record prices, for the time, were achieved. The realized prices yielded a profit, and it was divided among the bidders. I won a few important coins myself, and was excited that I was so successful. Even with the sales prices deducted from the "hammer price" all had made close to $1000 each. That was a tidy sum to earn for one day, and also gave each of us a profit. $1000 at that time was a lot of money to make for each of us for prices for rarities were always in the hundreds, rather than in the thousands.

Compared to today's market for similar coins, the prices today are much higher, and it would have lead to each of us who participated profits of probably as much as $10,000 each.

60 years later I am the only one still alive to have attended the sale, and able to tell a factual remembrance of the day at this now-famous auction!!!

The events of the day surely stick in my mind as a numismatic happening, and I am glad to provide some further details to your noteworthy story.