NEIL SHAFER MILITARY NUMISMATICS AWARD

MPC Fest announces new name of annual National Champion award

For over twenty years collectors of military currency and related objects have eagerly awaited the announcement of the winner of the annual National Championship competition held at MPC Fest. Each night of Fest attendees are matched against each other in a brackets-style competition testing their knowledge of military numismatics, including contents of The Book (World War Two Remembered: History in Your Hands, also known as Schwan-Boling) as well as material discovered through subsequent research. Each winner receives the title National Champion, and a silver Fest challenge coin of the year engraved Champion. Notable three-time winners include Neil Shafer, Jim Downey, Bill Myers, and Fred Schwan. By tradition these four have retired from the competition, to give aspiring contenders a chance at winning! This hard-earned award has never had a formal name, but this year, that will change.

MPC Fest, to honor one of our senior knowledge-bearers and sharers, and to celebrate the return to an in-person event after three years away, is deeply pleased to announce the naming of the award the Neil Shafer Military Numismatics National Champion Award.

A beloved and respected member of the Fest community and the wider numismatic world, Mr. Shafer's influence on the hobby cannot be overstated. His life is full of fascinating stories and his biography would fill many pages, but here are a few highlights. He has been an active collector and numismatist since the 1940s. He is a recipient of the ANA's Farran Zerbe Memorial Award for Distinguished Service in 2014, and the NLG Clemy Award in 2004, among other awards too numerous to list. He is a life member of many numismatic organizations including ANA, IBNS (and an early inductee to the IBNS Hall of Fame), SPMC, Philippine Numismatic and Antiquarian Society, many local and state clubs, and—for 20 plus years— a member of MPC Fest. A true educator and evangelist for numismatists, Mr. Shafer has written for every major publication, many smaller and local publications, has taught at ANA Summer Seminar, and has made presentations at an uncountable assortment of organizations, including over fifteen staff briefings at MPC Fest.

He served in the USAF, as a violist in the USAF Symphony Orchestra, from 1955 to 1959. Mr. Shafer is also famous throughout the MPC and wider numismatic communities for his little black bag, which accompanies him at all times. From this bag he extracts just exactly the one collectible that you had not realized you needed, had not budgeted for, but which you absolutely HAD to acquire before he could offer it to someone else!

As always, this year's Fest, Fest 24, will be held at Camp Leo May, Port Clinton, Ohio (Port Clinton-Catawba Island Holiday Inn Express), from March 16th to March 19th. The keynote speaker will be Thomas J. Sparks, speaking on The Short Snorter of Major General Clayton Lawrence Bissell, U.S. Army Air Service. Register by calling 419-732-7322. And watch this and other numismatic publications for announcement of this year's winner, the first to be awarded the Neil Shafer Military Numismatics National Champion Award!

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
2018 SPMC Hall of Fame Inductees (https://www.spmc.org/hall-of-fame?field_induction_year_value%5Bvalue%5D%5Byear%5D=2018)

To read earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
SHAFER WINS NLG'S "CLEMMY" (https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v07n36a05.html)
NEIL SHAFER'S 'MONEY OF THE PEOPLE' COLLECTION (https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v17n20a32.html)
SHORT SNORTER EXHIBIT COMING TO PHOENIX (https://www.coinbooks.org/v26/esylum_v26n06a26.html)

 

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web