Review: Cherrypickers Guide to Rare Die Varieties of United States Coins (Digital Editions)

If you want this, you need Volumes 1 and 2 to cover all denominations. Unfortunately, there is a somewhat limited market, so these are pricey: even the digital editions will cost you $40 for both.  I do not NOT recommend these - if you are going to buy them, buy the physical books unless you want these so that you can conveniently carry them to shows or wherever.  Those are the only circumstances where I would recommend the digital version.

I'm a fan of digital and try to buy all my books that way now, but when a digital book is done this badly, I just can't recommend it. It's a shame that such expensive titles are so poorly done!

By the way, these are Kindle format. You do not need to own a Kindle; Amazon has free Kindle Reader software for almost anything.

Problems:

First, it's obvious that they didn't make any effort to reformat the text for digital.

That 1855 heading should have started on the next screen. Leaving hangers like this is not just ugly, it can also be confusing and there's no reason for it. Kindle books have been around long enough that there are now people who specialize in offering reformatting services to get it right. Turning out junk like this is inexcusable for a major publishing company - especially at these prices.


Second, one of the obvious advantages of digital is that good photos can be included. These are not good photos - they are all black and white and when you zoom into them, the poor resolution is quite evident.

The books are also poorly indexed. It's difficult to find things (that fault also exists in the print edition). Digital search could overcome that, but the problem is inconsistency in text descriptions, making some searches fail when they should not. Authors need to be consistent for digital search to work well!


The next fault is that "low interest" varieties have been removed. That's fine, but look at this:

Only one of the 11-D Repunched Mint Marks is still listed in the book itself. They are shown only in these tables. Suppose you found one that wasn't the one described? Is it one of the low interest varieties (502 and 503)? Or maybe it's something yet unknown, but this won't help you, will it? An accompanying website listing all varieties could fix that and the content is obviously available from the older editions - do they expect us to buy all those also?  There is really no excuse for this with digital - you don't have weight or size constraints, so data like that should be included.

Finally, listings stop at different dates in different series. Are there no dime die varieties after 2004? You can't be sure if this is all you have to go by: dimes stop in 2004, but other series go on later. These issues would be true for the print editions also, of course.

All in all, an expensive and very poorly executed book. There are online resources that are much easier to use.

However, at least it is digital - most numismatic authors are  afraid of theft and won't consider it.

I've sold ebooks and made good money from it. Yes, I assume there was some theft, but as there were no production costs other than my typing, I'm also sure that I made out far, far better than I would have otherwise. With a very esoteric subject (Unix Troubleshooting, anyone?) and being an unknown author completely dependent on my own website, I cleared around $5,000 with zero outlay.

Then I discovered Amazon and put it up there.  I picked up a few hundred dollars more at $19.95 and then as sales dwindled off, reduced it to $2.99.  I STILL get sales years later even though the book is totally out of date and I am still an unknown name.  It's not much - $10 or so dribbling in now and then, but it adds up.

There are so many advantages: easy revisions, good pictures, high profit - I think numismatic authors who won't do this are really being short sighted.   You can serialize ebooks so that if there is theft you can find the source but in my experience, it's too little to fret over.

For existing books, you do have to consider reformatting for ebooks. If you just leave the same pagination, it can come out ugly - these e-versions of thee Cherry Pickers Guides are a good example of laziness producing a crappy result.  Done right, however, you get something far better than a print book and as mentioned earlier there are now people who specialize in that kind of reformatting for fairly short money.

I won't buy a print book now unless I HAVE to have it.  For many numismatic books, I'd buy an ebook version, but I don't need it enough to buy the print. It's not a matter of price; it's the convenience of having it on my iPad or phone wherever I am.

But most numismatic authors are opposed and it will probably stay like that until the next generation.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note: All my coins are in a safe deposit box. I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: 4th edition Top 100 Morgan Silver Dollar Varieties: The VAM Keys

I've been bitten by the VAM bug. VAM, if you don't already know, is the Morgan dollar variety system devised by Leroy Van Allen and George A. Mallis. There are several books and a large website devoted to identifying die varieties and die states. Many of the varieties are obscure and unimportant to any but the most serious collectors, but some have slipped into the Morgan mainstream and can command astonishing prices.

People bitten by the VAM bug could spend a fortune buying these coins, but it is possible to still find very rare and expensive varieties offered at normal prices by people who just do not know. For example, very recently someone reported snatching a 1888-O "scarface" variety from an unknowing Ebay seller. That it's a $10-$20,000 coin is amazing enough, but this particular variety is very easy to spot!

(Photo by Heritage Auctions, used by permission)

This book only covers the important varieties like Scarface, Hotlips and so on. It's vest pocket sized, so it is something you could carry to coin shows or unknowing pawn shops. The picture quality is very good. If I can't have digital, this is as good as it gets.

My VAM infection is not too serious. I don't have the financial resources to buy very many Morgans, even if I cherry picked every single one. Fortunately, my interest is only in one year: 1878. That's still a daunting task as there 22 even in the Top 100 list, so I doubt I'll ever complete that set, but it will be fun hunting and this book will help.


Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note: All my coins are in a safe deposit box. I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: A Guide Book of United States Coins Professional Edition

Speaking of Red Books as we did yesterday, I did not know this "Professional Edition" existed. I found out about it because I was reading back issues of The Numismatist. 

Let me quote from the introduction:

Its combination of more photographs, detailed higher-grade valuations, listings of additional varieties and rare early Proof coins, certified-coin population data, auction records, and other resources provides a wealth of information on every coin type ever made by the U.S. Mint. The Professional Edition is not an exhaustive study of die varieties, though it does expand (with close-up photographs, valuations, and chart notes) on the regular edition’s coverage of such coins. Rather, it is a handy single-source guide that educates its users in auction and certification trends, retail valuations, and similar aspects of the marketplace.

I bought the digital edition as I do with almost books where I have a choice.  This, however, is a case where I'll recommend that you buy the physical book.

It's not that the digital edition is badly formatted - that's actually done well. It's that the mintage and pricing tables are done as pictures that are somewhat fuzzy and do not zoom well.  These are probably much easier to read in the print edition.

That quibble aside, the content is excellent. This goes into much more detail than the traditional Red Book, though I do have to ask why publish both? There are unlikely to be many extra sales - I would think that, going forward, people will buy one or the other, not both.

The 5th edition shown here didn't cover Colonials, Tokens or Modern Commems - neither does the 6th edition (available now).  It seems odd to leave those out.

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book review: A Guide Book of Civil War Tokens by Q. David Bowers (Digital edition)

Although technically exonumia, both Hard Times and Civil War tokens circulated as money during times when official coinage was scarce. This makes them more interesting to collectors than they might have been otherwise.

Because all of these were completely unofficial, there is a wide variety of designs and also a great number of mixed obverse and reverse dies. For example, there are two dozen or more pages of tokens that look very much like this.

All of that means that it is certainly possible to discover an unknown type that never reached wide circulation. Even without that, these are fascinating and generally inexpensive to collect.

This book catalogs many tokens of this period. The color images are good quality and will expand to full page when you "pinch out", allowing you to fully examine details. This book is NOT just pictures of tokens with rarity estimates and values - there is a large amount of history and explanatory text also.

The only complaint I can make at all is that not all die pairings are shown, but of course if they were, the book would be even larger than it is.

This is much more than a "coin book". I'd recommend to anyone with an interest in history and of course it is particularly relevant to the Civil War period.


Because of the ability to zoom photos, I would suggest the digital Kindle version. Note that you do not have to own a Kindle; Amazon provides free Kindle readers for Windows, Mac, Ipads, Android and more.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: Numismatic Forgery

This is a disturbing book.  It's fun reading, but the author asserts that none of the forgery methods he details are difficult or outrageously expensive for the average person to reproduce. He disavows having personal knowledge of some techniques like explosive impact copying, yet manages to provide convincing photographic details of exactly that, making one wonder if his actual experience is more than he says!

It also makes you wonder what professional forgery teams might accomplish. We know the answer, of course, as we've all seen their output exposed in various articles.  But are the ones that are identified truly the best of the forgers art? Reading this book makes me suspect that there may well be harder to detect fakes and some may have even been certified as genuine!

This book isn't particularly helpful as a detection aid, but it will provide a thorough understanding of the processes used to create fakes.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note: All my coins are in a safe deposit box. I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book review: A Guide Book of Lincoln Cents by Q. David Bowers

I bought the Kindle edition of this as I usually will when available.  All too often, Kindle books have been poorly reformatted from the print version, leaving paragraph headings alone at the end of a page or orphan sentences. This book was better done than most in that area, but was not entirely perfect.

"

That said, I'm not unhappy. Q. David Bowers writes well and intersperses some of the drier areas of this subject with personal remembrances from his long career as a coin dealer. He covers the history of the Lincoln cent right up to 2008, with some mention of what was known to be coming in 2009 and 2010.

Let me pause for a moment for a bit of griping. It would be trivial to update this digital edition with more information about the cents of 2009 and beyond.  Instead, almost all publishers continue to treat their digital editions as mere mirrors of the print format. That's a shame.

Still, this remains and enjoyable and informative book. QDB draws on his own and other experts knowledge for numismatic and investment advice. You will like this book!

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: Fascinating Facts, Mysteries and Myths about U.S. Coins

This is really a fun book. I do have my doubts about some of the authors research, but that's unfortunately true of a great deal of numismatic writing: truth is often ignored in favor of a good yarn.

That said, there are end notes citing sources for most of the assertions made and the author did seem to take extra care in verifying some of the tales. So, while I always am slightly mistrustful of anything I read that isn't completely vetted, this is probably safer than a lot of numismatic writing (see, for example, my complaints about The Numismatist).

One reviewer called the writing style "dry". I don't agree, though I can certainly understand that if are not numismatically inclined you might well think so.

I reviewed the Kindle edition, which is no bargain as it is only a dollar less than the print version. Either way, a fun read.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: The Joy of Collecting United States Coins, Volume 1, Obsolete United States Copper Large Cents

This is a short (21 page) introduction to collecting United States Large Cents. It is only available digitally and I think the price ($5.78) is unreasonably high considering both the length and the fact that there is nothing here you cannot find elsewhere for less money or even free.

Additionally, the photos (the few that there are) are formatted badly: every one has a cut off caption box as shown here.

I don't know why people produce books like this. It's not that the content is bad, but I just can't see many sales coming out of it, especially for 21 scant pages at that price. Why not throw that up on a free website and use Google Adsense as I do here? No, you wouldn't get rich from that, but you'd probably make more money than trying to sell it as an ebook!

I'll provide the Amazon link, but honestly I wouldn't bother with this one.

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: One Coin is Never Enough: Why and How We Collect

If you are a coin collector, you probably have friends or family who think that your passion is a little odd or perhaps even a tiny bit crazy. You may even agree with them to some extent.

Why do we collect? Yes, we can trot out the stock answers: I love history, it's an investment, it's just a hobby to fill time. But is there more?

That's what this book explores: the different sorts of collectors, the reasons for collecting, the cycles, the rewards and the disappointments. The author writes well and although there really is little about numismatics per se, I think most collectors would enjoy this.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Book Review: Basic Coin Design - is less more?

The Amazon blurb for this book states that it is "a startlingly helpful analysis of basic design questions".  I'm not so sure about that, but I will grant that it is mildly interesting. 

The author did a statistical analysis of the basic design elements of U.S. coins and concluded that with one exception using fewer elements leads to a more popular coin. That one exception is the Morgan Silver dollar.

Along the way, he discusses the meaning and history of various elements, whether they usually appear on the front or the back (and how to tell which is the heads and which is the tails) and more. As I said, that's all mildly interesting.

However, my big gripe is that it's horribly formatted.  I might have enjoyed this more if every page didn't look like this:

Seriously, the author expects people to pay $7.99 for a 70 or so page digital book that's difficult to read?

If he fixes the formatting and lowers the price, he might sell a few. Otherwise, I can't see it.

Amazon link: Basic Coin Design by Michael Bugeja

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: Making Money with Modern Coins and Bullion

I expected that I would not like this book, so much so that I almost didn't bother to read it. To my surprise, I found this to be well written, intelligent and informative.

There are times the author does become a bit pedantic. Do we really need several pages on how to properly seal a package, complete with pictures?

Well, perhaps some people do need that. Those of us with a bit more common sense can ignore things like that and concentrate on the rest of what truly is an excellent book on numismatic investment in modern coins and bullion.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review: The Collectors Handbook

The Collector's Handbook: Tax Planning, Strategy, and Estate Advice for Collectors and their Heirs 

This book is not focused on numismatic collections, although that subject is mentioned frequently. Nor is it strongly focused on the acquisition phase of your collection. Instead, it is advice for selling or giving way any sort of collection, be it art, stamps, paintings, coins or whatever.

This is mostly aimed at collections of higher value - say at least a few hundred thousand dollars - and much of the advice wouldn't really apply until much higher values. Still, there can be surprises and this book is interspersed with tales of collections not thought to be worth much (even by the appraisers) that ultimately sold for astonishing sums. The opposite is also true, of course.

It's that admixture of stories that turns what might otherwise be a dull (though useful) book into something actually interesting to read even if you don't need to worry about your heirs squabbling over your multi million dollar collection when you are gone.

Buy this book at Amazon and help support this site.

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book Review of Numismatic Art in America: Aesthetics of the United States Coinage

I really don't understand why I hadn't heard of this. Published in 2007, this 289 page book with over 400 color illustrations is one of the best numismatic books I have ever read!

One of the few Amazon reviewers said "Not a coin book filled with history info".  In fact, it is chock full of history and trivia! 

Perhaps that reviewer skimmed and noticed only the commentary on the artistic antecedents and merits. There is a lot of that and I found it very interesting.   Or perhaps they expected mintage figures, die states and prices? That's not the point here - this is the history of the designs and the designers!

In addition to the coins from 1792 to 2007, this covers the medals created by the designers.

History, criticism, praise: it's all here. Cornelius Vermeule pulls no punches when a coin is ugly, but is lavish in his praise when not. Interestingly, he likes the Barber coins, which I do not. I admit that they are attractive when not circulated, but he insists that even worn Barbers retain their beauty.

On most other things, I agree. By the way, he includes other people's opinions and quotes liberally from newspaper and magazine reviews. As I have little knowledge of art history, this book also taught me quite a bit about that and how prior art has influenced the design of our coinage.

I ordered the print version after reading the digital because I assumed it would be a truly beautiful book and was not at all disappointed - the photos are excellent and very impressive.

This is not a book you will just sit down and read once. I expect to be going back to it again and again.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Hard Times tokens: A complete revision and enlargement of Lyman H. Low's 1899 classic reference

There is something strange about this book. It sells on Amazon for anywhere from $20 to more than ten times that. I don't understand why - I paid $10 for my copy and would have been very unhappy to have paid more.  It is out of print and I suspect it will remain so because it's not such a great book at all.

It's not the written content: that's fine. There are examples shown for everything covered and even some larger pictures too. The pictures are black and white, as is expected for a book of this time. Although I'd obviously prefer color, the real problem is that they are low quality. You really can't make out much detail, and that's not helpful when trying to identify tokens.

In addition to the tokens catalogued in the main book, an appendix has the 1980 Garret auction of hard times tokens, which contained some rarely seen pieces. Perhaps the perceived value here is as an antique?

Well, if you think so, buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Clue for the second 2014 Silver Eagle Giveaway:  C.S.A, Sommer Islands and Continental Congress Congress too! 

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

United States Pattern Coins (Official Red Book)

I think every other "Official Red Book" manages to at least get a splash of red somewhere on the cover, but the 10th edition (2008) United States Pattern Coins (Official Red Book) is  blue. It's an attractive book, actually.

It's also in full color. That wasn't the case for previous editions, so if you go looking for this, make sure you get the 10th edition.

The photographs are not high quality, but they are more than enough to show you what these coins look like. As there are unique patterns that haven't been seen for years, it's amazing to have photos at all!

For each coin, you'll find:

• The metal used 
• Edge (reeded, lettered, plain or unknown)
• Rarity
• Number of PCGS, NGC and ANACS graded
• Number of times at auction since 1990 - sometimes zero
• The auction house and how much it sold for
• The grade the coin sold
• What a specimen might sell for today in various grades

But there's more to this than just that.  For example, J-610 and J-611 are nickel and copper versions of an 1868 Large Cent. The text explains that the obverse was probably meant to be for a ten cent coin, but someone decided to grab an old large cent reverse die and strike a few dozen coins. Such chicanery was not unusual at the Mint in this time period. From the late 1850's to 1885, those with the right connections could apparently get almost anything they wanted struck or restruck.

The historical detail makes this a fascinating book even if you have no great interest in patterns.

United States Pattern Coins (Official Red Book) is usually available new for $20 to $30 and can be found used for $17 or so.

Clue for the second 2014 Silver Eagle Giveaway:  NGC Registry #831

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Book review of Screw the BS: How to Invest in gold and silver

This is a very short book - 76 pages.  Nevertheless, it contains good advice and background information on metal investing.

The author (Tony Chou) expects gold and silver to peak around 2017. For 99 cents (Kindle edition) you can find out why and what he thinks is the smart way to invest in metals.

By the way, he does mention numismatic coins - he doesn't recommend them, of course, but he does mention them.

What does he recommend? Physically backed ETF funds. I don't know that his 2017 peak prediction will be right, but I do agree with him on ETF stocks - if you want to invest in these metals, that's the way to go. Unless, of course, you think the world is going to collapse into chaos, in which case you should be buying junk silver coins and small denomination bullion gold coins - neither of which are recommended by Tony Chou, who suggests guns and food stockpiles instead if you really think that doomsday scenario is possible.  I agree with him on that, also. 

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Clue for the second 2014 Silver Eagle Giveaway:  Goldine, Silver, or Brass:  a die gauge between the C and O in Continental identifies these.

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Old Cent Whist

Penny Whimsy was written in the 1940's, but has been republished with corrections several times. The link below is for the 1990 version.  Don't be too put off at the price; I was able to find a used copy for less than $60.

Mine was cheap because it had been owned by Bowers and Merena and scribbled in here and there by a fellow named John Pack.  Book collectors don't like scribbling.

I don't mind scribbling at all, especially when it might be useful notes from a professional. It was just brackets and circling, though.

The book covers Large Cents from 1793 to 1814. I don't even own a single example of that type any longer, but I still like having this book, especially at such a low price. 

At the end of the book, Sheldon describes the game of Old Cent Whist.  As he tells it, some advanced collectors would sometimes gather with their collections and, starting with the first variety of 1793, bring out their coins one by one. Having the variety counted as one point, having it in the best condition counted as another.

Obviously few of us could play that game with old large cents today and perhaps not with anything except generic type coins.  

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Clue for the second 2014 Silver Eagle Giveaway:  He had connections with Sheldon

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

The Secret History of the First U.S. Mint: How Frank H. Stewart Destroyed, And Then Saved A National Treasure

This is a large, 8-1/2 x 11 book. That makes it wonderful for the hundreds of full color illustrations and photos, but the large size and the nearly 2.5 pound weight do make it somewhat uncomfortable to read.

I do recommend this book to those interested in numismatic history. An Amazon reviewer asserts that it is not devoted to numismatics, and it is true if you emphasize "devoted", but there are plenty of numismatic tidbits to be found and many pictures of the coins that are part of the story. Stewart's own collection is shown and discussed at length also.  There is a great deal of numismatic interest in this book.

That said, the authors do take their title seriously. This is the history of the first Mint; the land upon which it was built and the ownership of each parcel before and the Mint's operation, the details of each building, including which came first and the confusion that various other chroniclers have contributed, the people involved (primarily Frank Huling Stewart) and what happened to the buildings after the Mint itself moved on to larger quarters.

There are times when all the minutia gets both confusing and boring, but the depth of research and documentation is impressive and admirable.  As the authors explain, this work was originally intended to be a short article in the Numismatist but their research kept leading them deeper and deeper.

Any U.S. coins you may own dated before 1833 (excluding restrikes) were produced at this first Mint. For a good part of its history, men and horses provided all the energy needed; a 10 horsepower steam engine did not come until 1816, but even that was only used for drawing, rolling and some planchet cutting. Human muscle power still struck the coins until the second Mint in 1833.

This is a book worth owning if you enjoy coins and history.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Clue for the second 2014 Silver Eagle Giveaway:  Definitely a striking fellow

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

The American Numismatic Association's Numismatist Magazine

Way back in the 70's, I was a member of the ANA - the American Numismatic Association.  When my interest in coins rekindled this year, I joined again and was happy to see that the Numismatist magazine  is available online along with several years of back issues.

My happiness was short lived. As I read through the back issues, I became uncomfortable. Certainly some of the articles appeared to be authoritative and well researched. But others are obviously not, which makes me hesitant to accept anything published there as fact.

Although there were other examples I could point to, the one that caused me to actually groan was a retelling of the nonsensical story of "Josh Tatum" and gold plated 1883 No Cents nickels. It ended with a twist I hadn't heard before:

Josh Tatum's flirt with the Law gave birth to the phrase, "I'm just joshing you."

As any decent dictionary will tell you that "josh", meaning teasing or joking, has been in use for decades prior to 1883, that's plainly nonsense.  The rest of the story is too: there are no police records or newspaper reports of any Josh Tatum attempting to pass gold plated nickels as a deaf mute or otherwise. In fact, the story seems to have been made up in the 1960's.  Plainly there is no fact checking at the Numismatist!

Interestingly, someone rehashed that story at a coin forum I frequent. When I pointed out the facts, he retorted that it was "just a coin related story I found amusing and thought others might as well".

Yes, amusing. Untrue, but amusing. Shall I send in an equally amusing story concerning how my grandfather stole a hat from Victor D. Brenner in 1909? I promise you, it's a worthy tale and it explains where the phrase "I'll eat my hat!" came from.  None of it's true, but hey, it's  a coin related story I found amusing and I thought others might as well!

If it were not for the discount coin insurance, I would not be renewing my ANA subscription next year. Even at that, I may not.

Note:  All my coins are in a safe deposit box.  I keep nothing in my home. 

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html

Morgan Dollar: America's Love Affair with a Legendary Coin

According to the Amazon page, this book is supposed to be released on June 24th, so I placed a pre-order. To my complete surprise, Fedex delivered it today, June 5th.

This is a year by year, highly detailed examination of Morgan dollars. Not by die variety like the VAM book, but the history of each coin: changes to dies, certified population and price guides, plus historical trivia related to the coin, its mint or Morgan himself. It's a market study and a history lesson with Morgan Dollars as the backdrop.

Each year is illustrated with high-resolution photographs from the Coronet Collection, the PCGS Number One Finest Morgan Dollar registry set of all time.

If you are a serious collector of Morgans, you'll probably want this.

Buy this book at Amazon and help me support this site!

Note: All my coins are in a safe deposit box. I keep nothing in my home.

Contests and giveaways: http://coins.aplawrence.com/2014/05/contests-and-giveaways.html