STAN KESSELMAN INTERVIEW, PART SIX

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V27 2024 INDEX E-SYLUM ARCHIVE

The E-Sylum: Volume 27, Number 30, July 28, 2024, Article 19

Greg Bennick's latest interview for the Newman Numismatic Portal is with New York dealer Stan Kesselman. Here's the sixth part, where Stan talks about Ted Naftzger and Amon Carter, Jr. -Editor

GREG BENNICK: Okay. Were there other dealers from back in the day that you connected with? You know, you mentioned Abe Kosoff and other people as well. Were there other dealers from that era that you remember having interactions with that you liked?

STANLEY KESSELMAN: That's an excellent question you ask. And I'm going to tell you why. For some reason, I became a hoarder. And what did I hoard? Correspondences. I have letters, invoices, from people from 1957 through modern times.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: I put them in suitcases and did not open the suitcases for 40 years.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: So, I finally opened one suitcase, and I found 25 letters from Superior, Ted Naftzger, Harry Bass, and David Bowers. Abe Kossoff, Saul Kagin, not Saul Kagin, A.M. Kagin, and his brother, Paul Kagin. I have letters going back. So, I called Julian up, what to do with them. He told me to send them to the Newman Archive.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: But I was a little bit conflicted, and I gave Andrew Bowers, David's son who works for Stacks, all the David Bowers letters, maybe 25 of them. Rather than sending them in. And David Bowers had letterheads from so many different firms. There was Bowers and Ruddy. There was Paramount. There was Hathaway and Bowers. There's probably a couple more. And I had all the letterheads, and I gave them to Andrew.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: I had maybe ten letters written by Julian Liedman. And I gave Julian his letters. And I told him, he sold me an 1886-20 in AU for like $2,100. I told him I never got the coin. I said, you owe me the coin now. I was joking, of course.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: All right. So, I was just teasing him, but I sent him his letters. And then I sent one suitcase to the Newman Archives. And they were very happy to get them.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: Some of the letters are controversial. I never went into the story of the pennies that were stolen. That Ted Naftzger ended up with.

GREG BENNICK: Oh, wow! Yeah, I don't know the story. You're welcome to share it or not as you choose.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: No, the story was that I'm trying to remember all the names. Ted Naftzger bought the best coin there was. Somebody went to the society, ANS, and switched coins.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: They took the best coin and put in another one. And then they sold the best coin to Naftzger. Who didn't know. I mean, the best coin, the next best coin. I mean, you're talking very close. So, Ted Naftzger had these coins that were stolen. Somebody, these large cent people are experts. Variety wise, they know every coin, where it is, where it came from. They saw Ted Naftzger had the coins. They reported it to the society. So, the society made a deal whereby Ted Naftzger would replace their coins, give them back. And he could take the one they had, the second best one. And they make this trade, give them back the stolen coins and take the spare.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: Yeah, he had a son-in-law who was a lawyer, and they refused the deal.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: So, now they went to court. And there's a letter there from Walter Breen talking about the case. Ted Naftzger, unfortunately, towards the end of his life, had dementia. So, he did not make a good witness for himself. He could not remember. So, he ended up losing the case, totally. And for the last five years of his life, or six years of his life, I didn't talk to him. And his wife was very angry with me that I didn't call. But it was difficult to try to speak to him, you know, because I knew him when he was well. And I didn't know what kind of conversation I'd have with him. So, I always felt they could call me if they wanted to speak to me, which they never did. But he was an unbelievable gentleman, but he lost the case. He got bad legal advice, in my opinion.

Some of the coins Ted Naftzger bought at auction, public auction. And they were stolen. And at the end of the day, while he still had his, you know, faculties, he calls me up again. And now he wants to sell his large cents. Totally. And we sold the large cents to Stacks. And Eric, I forget his last name, did the deal with Stacks, used Stacks' money and did it. And they bought the best, you know, 1793 large cents, chains, wreaths, and everything. And I did buy a few coins for Ted Naftzger in 1976, large cents. I paid, I think, $125,000 for a 1793. And they got written up in the papers. But it was for Ted Naftzger, He wanted it. It was the Garrett sale, the Garrett coin, which recently sold over a million dollars. You know, sure.

So, there's a lot of stories, a lot of friends. Everybody pretty much got along. Even though we were competitive. Mike Brownlee was my biggest competition with Johnny Rowe. And I stayed at his house in Dallas, you know, even though it was competition. I stayed at Harry Bass' house. And Harry Bass had a refrigerator that was the size of my bedroom. He could eat there for a month. And I could tell you more stories.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: I met him a couple of times. We were having dinner with him in a restaurant. He was the last to arrive. Okay. When he walked into the room, everybody at the table stood up until he was seated, like you do the President of the United States. He was friendly, nicest person in the world. All these people, John Morrell, Hogue, Harry Bass, they were all the friendliest people in the world, but they have their own demons, I guess, as all people do.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: So, Amon Carter would come into the room, every 12 people at the table, just stand up, wait till he's seated, and then sit down. And we bought some of his coins and sold them to Jeff Browning. My favorite coin there, he had an 1882 twenty in his $20 gold set that he thought it was a proof. It was not a proof. It was the finest uncirculated example. I think they graded it 63. And the uncirculated 63, there's nothing close to it. Proofs exist. There may be 60 some odd proofs of which, I don't know, twenty survived. The uncirculated coin, when he found out it was uncirculated, he was unhappy. But it's worth a lot more than a proof. Cause people appreciate that now.

GREG BENNICK: All of these stories, the Harry Bass stories and the Naftzger stories and your stories, of course, about your gold coin experiences and your experiences as a part-time but really experienced coin dealer, all of them have been absolutely amazing.

STANLEY KESSELMAN: And it's a shame that all these people are no longer with us.

GREG BENNICK: It is, but I really appreciate you telling stories about them, which is going to keep the memory of these folks and their legacy alive, which is a large part of why I'm doing these interviews, is to hear stories about people who are no longer with us.

About the Interviewer
Greg Bennick (www.gregbennick.com) is a keynote speaker and long time coin collector with a focus on major mint error coins. Have ideas for other interviewees? Contact him anytime on the web or via instagram @minterrors.