"I was very saddened to hear of the passing of Karl Moulton. We talked regularly about all things numismatic, he was a good person and loved our hobby. Although not commonly known, Karl was one of the great numismatists of our time. His encyclopedic knowledge of 19 th century US auction catalogues, the US mint and US coinage always amazed me. I would often contact Karl before major numismatic literature auctions to make sure I didn't overlook some special item. When the Newman library came up for auction, I called Karl. His immediate response was: make sure you try and buy the 1809 Perkins Bank Bill Test with plates from the Streeter collection. Karl had probably been to Newman's bank vault and seen the Perkins in person.

  "Most recently, in the spring of 2020, I purchased hundreds of items from Karl's personal library. This transaction went on for months, Karl would send me packages and lists almost weekly. One of my favorite purchases was a priced and named copy of Woodward's 1864 McCoy sale in a beautiful contemporary binding, lot 967. Upon receipt of the catalogue, I saw the familiar JF sticker in the inside cover. I immediately looked in the Ford PRL and saw that it had sold reasonably, things like this didn't get past Karl.

   "I knew Karl for 20 years and we had a close connection beyond numismatics, Karl loved hot rods and old Chevy's. He was in the process of finishing a long-term project, a 1957 Chevrolet Belair. Once about 10 years ago I picked Karl up in Congress, AZ and we made a trip together to Las Vegas to buy some rare Pontiac engine parts. I was attending the annual January Barrett Jackson auto auction and had just finished paying Karl for his Deluxe Browning; he of course loved early bust quarters and Deluxe Browning's were a favorite of his. I told him of my plan to drive up to Las Vegas and of my intention to pick up the Browning, Karl being the car guy that he was wanted to ride along. I will always remember that trip together.

  "RIP Karl."

Karl's passing was a surprise and shock to all of us in the numismatic literature community. He will be missed. I added an old photo of Karl from his former website, coincats.com. -Editor

"WOW! Thank you for bringing attention to the great article on the George Orr pieces! Aren't these wild?!?!?"

 

They're something else, alright. I tried publishing as few racy words as possible and last week's issue got caught in some ISP spam filters anyway. If you missed the issue, everything is archived online at our website. -Editor

Our recent discussion about purging the numismatic record echoes Ron Guth's July blog post, "First They Came For The Statues...". See the complete article online; here's the addendum. -Editor

 

"People collect coins for a host of reasons, including their intrinsic value, the beauty of their designs, their historical significance, and, yes, even their symbolism. Numismatists (coin collectors) are generally well-intentioned people who simply enjoy their hobby. Just because someone collects a particular coin does not mean they endorse the philosophical or political views of the government that produced the coins. Coins are an important part of human history -- in some cases, they are the only remnants or certain people, places, and events -- and to deny or attempt to erase that history dooms us to repeat it."

"I also spotted Sam Buttrey on Jeopardy! and made the connection with his father. In fact, Prof. Sam Buttrey has at least one numismatic work to his credit, an article in the ANS AJN 9 (1997): Calculating ancient coin production, again, co-authored with Ted Buttrey, that concerns another numismatic debate – whether it is possible to calculate the size of an ancient coin emission based on die studies.

"Prof. Buttrey took the championship in the Professors Tournament!

"By the way, Prof. Buttrey's TV appearance has sparked some internet buzz concerning his resemblance to Steve Martin. I admit I did a double-take when he first popped up on screen!"

Thanks. Decide for yourself - it is a great resemblance. -Editor

 
Steve Martin and Sam Buttrey

"I first met Bob Lloyd in the late 1990s when I became involved with the Buffalo Numismatic Association. The club would only meet once a year at this time but when I became President I implemented monthly meetings. I would pick Bob up and drive him to and from the meetings for a few years until he found it hard to be away from home. My wife, Debbie, and I would visit him at his home on many occasions. He was definitely an inspiration.

"I have Bob's original photo of the 1934 convention in my collection. On the back, he lists some (not all) of the people in the photo. The person identified last week as Bob is incorrect although Bob does not name him. Bob is to that person's left (our right) by 3 people. In this photo to Bob's right (our left) is Nelson Hopkins and to Bob's left (our right) is Jesse Taylor both instrumental members of the Buffalo Numismatic Association in 1934. The woman in front of Jesse is Gladys Hepworth (Lloyd). I hope this isn't too confusing.

"At some point, I will write an article on my experiences in knowing Bob Lloyd (and Gladys) who was a great numismatist and had a good sense of humor. His mind was as sharp as a tack right up to his very last day and he had a fantastic memory."

Michael Kodysz kindly revised his identifications based on this new information. Thank you both! -Editor

 

 

"An interesting side note on the photo. I guess Bob found it difficult to store some of these items and so decided he should cut his panoramic photo into three pieces to better fit the file folder. EEK!!!"

Ouch! -Editor

"American yodeling goes back a lot farther than Jimmie Rogers. In the late 1800s & early 1900s, Pete LeMaire was recording various yodeling songs on Columbia's cylinder-style records. BTW, according to my younger brother's genealogical research, Pete LeMaire was my great grandmother's (on my mother's side) brother."

"I realize that you'll probably received 100 emails on the topic, but the picture that you present of Goebel Reeves is usually identified as Woody Guthrie in image collections on search engines such as Google and Bing."

"The photo identified as Goebel Reeves is actually Woody. Hardly a numismatist, Guthrie did record a version of "One Dime Blues.""

Whoops. My fault all the way. Hopefully I got this one right. -Editor

"The story of the Bangko Sentral Ng Pilipinas (BSP) misspelling of Pithecophaga Jefferyi brought an immediate smile to my face. As noted in the story, this is not the first-time bank designers have misspelled the eagle's scientific name! But as Paul Harvey use to say, "and now for the rest of the story"!

"Attached are photos of a 1985 ANACS certified AU 55 50 sentimo coin in my collection where BSP misspelled the name "Pithecobhaga Jefferyi."

"One might expect that institutional memory or triple-checking all spellings might resolve this oft-repeated mistake by the BSP. Oh well, such mistakes make our hobby more fun in the long run."

 

Cool. Thanks. -Editor

"Last week, John Madlon mentioned the old ANACS photo certificates but didn't show one. Attached you will find one of the certificates. I have also included a photo of the old INS photo certificates."

 

 

 

 

Thanks. -Editor

"Regarding Pete Smith's piece about ANA members who received longevity awards when in fact they had been deceased for some time, I have a story that helps to explain this phenomenon.

"A number of years ago I saw among the recently deceased ANA members listed in The Numismatist one Clifford Bloom. Now, I had known Cliff Bloom for several years as a fellow member of the Pacific Coast Numismatic Society, and I knew also that he had died almost ten years before his passing was published. Since he'd been a very interesting and idiosyncratic person who I deemed worthy of a few words, I sent my recollections to then-editor Barbara Gregory in a letter (that's how long ago this was) that also informed her he had been gone quite some time. She wrote back to me that a number of people who are life members and who live alone and/or have no close family continue on the membership rolls long past their deaths simply because no one notifies the ANA that they are deceased. Their copies of The Numismatist continue to be sent year after year and, since they do not go First Class mail, the sender isn't notified that the addressee no longer lives there.

"It's anyone's guess what becomes of those magazines. I'd like to think that it results in a few new members among those who thus discover numismatics for the first time, but that's a real longshot. Needless to say, my recollections of Cliff went unpublished.

"Since this topic in The E-Sylum was prompted by the long-term membership of Robert H. Lloyd, and that further led to mention of the Halle Bros. Department store being seen in a photo of the 1934 Cleveland ANA Convention, I have a (very) peripheral addition to make.

The attached image is of the cover of Stamp and Coin News for Spring 1958. This was put out quarterly by Robert Friedberg under his Coin & Currency Institute, and each store in his network of coin and stamp departments received its shipment custom overprinted with that store's name. Of course, the one illustrated is for The Halle Bros. Co. in Cleveland. The title of this publication was always very misleading, as it was devoted almost solely to stamps, the coin content limited to, at most, two pages. After Friedberg's death in 1963 it was soon simplified to just Stamp News, as there must have been a lot of complaints from coin collectors."

Thank you! -Editor

"Regarding Hitler appearing on coins - if I remember correctly, the dictator appeared on numerous medals, notgeld and innumerable stamps but never on a circulating coin. Strange but true. I wonder why this was the case for both Hitler and Mussolini as you'd think this to be a natural for any self-respecting egomaniac."

"In Republic of Sarah (HBO) Season 1, 4th Episode (In Us We Trust) the town of Greylock (which features many historical comments about Ethan Allen, Green Mtn Boys, John Stark etc) comes up with the need to produce a local currency (similar to Depression SCRIP...my description is = Substitute-Currency-Replacing-Internationallyrecognized-Payments) with some novel ideas like anti-counterfeiting glitter mixed in the blender to make color changing ink etc.

"And besides the picture of the Yap stones, featured in this episode are: New Zealand's $5 note with Sir Edmund Hillary, an Aruba 10 Florin with a turtle (it would have been more appropriate to show the 25 Florin of the same series - with the rattlesnake leading into the motto of 'Don't Tread on me'), a Kazak Tenge note, an Australian polymer note etc.

"Also in the movie 'Jungle Cruise' about 18 minutes in, features a payment made in Brazilian, Banco do Café notes."

 

Fun topic. Thanks. -Editor

 

"I've been trying to find a publication that can help me attribute the attached Medallion from Cuba.

"This is a tough one to find anything about, eBay does not allow people to offer Cuban coinage due to 'restrictions', this medal slipped through the cracks as it was listed as an unknown medal.

"I thought the embargo on Cuba had been eased, but perhaps I'm incorrect in that. Either way, finding information on this is a challenge.

"So far my research has only come up with one offering of two of the same medal in the UK back in 2012, no attribution was given to the medals and they did not sell.

"I have put pictures up in a couple of medal forums and no-one at this point can point me to a reference or knows anything about it.

"I've also searched exposition websites and Cuba is not showing up as attending any of the World Expo's in 1922, nor is there any mention in any sources I have tried of an expo being held in Habana (Havana).

"Multiple dead ends and no further along. Perhaps the readers may know about this or can point me in the direction I need to go?"

Can anyone help? I also pointed Michael to the Cuban Numismatic Society. -Editor

Pete Smith passed along this great 1910 Wanamaker Santa Claus item. Thanks! -Editor

 

David Pickup passed along holiday greetings from the Oxford Numismatic Society. Thank you. Merry Christmas! -Editor