Volume XXXIX Number 1 January 2005 Consecutive Issue #226 Copyright 2005 Early American Coppers, Inc. All Rights Reserved TABLE OF CONTENTS Directory of Officers Page 2 Harry E. Salyards 3 Editor’s Introduction ORIGINAL ARTICLE Bill Maryott 5 The Early Mint from a Different Perspective MEETINGS AND MEMBERSHIP NOTES Nick Gampietro 9 EAC Meeting in Buffalo Bill Eckberg 10 EAC Annapolis, April 21-24 Dan Trollan 12 2005 Large Cent Happening Greg Heim 12 2005 Half Cent Happening Chris McCawley 13 EAC Sale Call for Consignments John Kraljevich 14 Tours at EAC, Annapolis Chuck Heck 14 A Call for Seminars & Volunteers Steve Carr 15 Exhibits & Grading Seminar Rod Burress 16 Candidates for Membership MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTOR NOTES Red Henry 16 A Hoard of Unattributed Large Cents in Baltimore Mike Gebhardt 18 Take the Time to Really Look at Your Coins James Higby 19 How We Feel About All Those Copper Problems, Ch. 3 John D. Wright 22 Making Sense John Pijewski 25 Coins in Novels LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 26 FROM THE INTERNET Gene Anderson 29 SWAPS AND SALES 32 -1- EAC OFFICERS, 2002 – 2005 TERM NATIONAL OFFICERS President: Jon Warshawsky, 10927 Caminito Arcada, San Diego CA 92131 [email protected] Vice–President: Dan Holmes, 16900 South Waterloo Road, Cleveland, OH 44110 (216) 486–4000 [email protected] Secretary: Denis Loring, Box 32115, Palm Beach Gardens, FL 33420 [email protected] Treasurer: John D. Wright, 1468 Timberlane Drive, St. Joseph, MI 49085 [email protected] Membership: Rod Burress, 9743 Leacrest, Cincinnati, OH 45215 P–W Editor: Harry Salyards, 606 North Minnesota, Hastings, NE 68901 [email protected] Librarian: Mabel Ann Wright, 1468 Timberlane Drive, St. Joseph, MI 49085 Historian: Peter C. Smith, 2424 4th Street, NE, #12, Minneapolis, MN 55418 EAC Sale: M&B Auctions, c/o Bob Grellman, PO Box 951988, Lake Mary, FL 32795 [email protected] REGIONAL OFFICERS Region #1: New England: ME, NH, VT, MA, RI, CT Chairman: Charlie Davis, PO Box 547, Wenham, MA 01984 [email protected] Secretary: George Trostel, 49 Bristol Street, Southington, CT 05489 Region #2: New York – New Jersey: Chairman: Chuck Heck, PO Box 298, Bohemia, NY 11716 [email protected] Secretary: H. Craig Hamling, PO Box 604, Florida, NY 10921 Region #3: Mid–Atlantic: PA, MD, DE, VA, WV, DC, NC Chairman: Bill Eckberg, PO Box 19079, Alexandria, VA 22320 [email protected] Secretary: Red Henry, PO Box 2498, Winchester, VA 22604 Region #4: Southeast: FL, GA, AL, MS, SC, TN Chairman: Bob Grellman, PO Box 951988, Lake Mary, FL 32795 [email protected] Secretary: Don Weathers, PO Box 30996, Myrtle Beach, SC 29588 Region #5: North Central: OH, MI, WI, MN, KY, IN, IL, IA, NE, SD, ND Chairman: Terry Hess, PO Box 251111, Woodbury, MN 55125 [email protected] Secretary: Joe Tomasko, PO Box 388386, Chicago, IL 60638 Region #6: South Central: KS, AR, LA, MO, OK, CO, NM, TX Chairman: Bill Yates, 7620 Skylake Drive, Ft. Worth, TX 76179 [email protected] Secretary: Chris McCawley, PO Box 2967, Edmond, OK 73083 Region #7: West: CA, WA, OR, MT, WY, UT, ID, AZ, NV, HI, AK Chairman: Dan Demeo, PO Box 508, Redondo Beach, CA 90277 [email protected] Secretary: Phil Moore, PO Box 396, Van Nuys, CA 91408 Region #8: Internet Chairman: Mark Switzer [email protected] Webmaster: H. Craig Hamling [email protected] ________________________ Penny–Wise, published every two months without interruption since 1967. Founding Editor: Warren A. Lapp (1915 – 1993), Editor–in–Chief 1967 – 1986. Editor–in–Chief: Harry E. Salyards, MD, 1986 – Contributing Editors: Denis W. Loring, John D. Wright Typist: Debra A. Johnson, 119 Ringland Road, Hastings, NE 68901 Printed by Lithotechnical Services, Inc., 1600 West 92nd Street, Minneapolis, MN 554 -2- INTRODUCTION BY THE EDITOR: A REBIRTH FOR VARIETY COLLECTING? Harry E. Salyards Over 18 years ago, I wrote a piece for Penny-Wise entitled “The Future of Variety Collecting” (Vol. XX, pp. 301-304, 1986). In it, I painted a rather gloomy picture. What I didn’t foresee were two developments that may have given variety collecting a new lease on life. The first of these is the Internet. For all of the problems cited about sleazy sellers on eBay, the fact remains that this source has opened up a “fresh infusion of unattributed cents” (and half cents: witness Ed Fuhrman’s 1804 C-3, reported on in the November P-W). It has also created a vast individual-to-individual market where none existed before. Instead of being at the mercy of those general dealers who buy at one grade and sell at another, Everyman becomes his own dealer. And I sense that this has been a tremendously encouraging development for “people of slender means,” to again quote Dr. Sheldon. The second development--in a perverse sort of way--is the great proliferation of slabbed coins--and with it, the development of an overtly two-tiered grading scheme. For years, it has been recognized that the slabbed “62” may be an EAC “45,” or the slabbed “50” an EAC “30”; but only recently have we seen the phenomenon of these different grading opinions presented side-by-side in auction catalogs. And as long as the market values were essentially identical, it really didn’t matter, anyway! But this is less and less the case, particularly where “type coin” or “condition rarity” issues become involved. Let’s look at several coins from the recently-completed sale of Wes Rasmussen’s magnificent collection. (Since I wasn’t able to attend the sale in person, as I write this, I don’t have the prices realized before me. So the values I’ll quote are from Penny Prices and the January 3, 2005 issue of Coin World’s Coin Values.) I examined each of these coins in person at EAC San Diego, and made my own grading determinations on them. The first of these is Lot 3066, the 1794 S-57. This is a not particularly descript, rather common variety. While it carried an EAC “40” grade in the catalog, I graded it a “35”; and in fact, Wes’s envelope accompanying the coin carried that same number. The parallel slab grade was NGC “53.” Penny Prices quotes a value of $2500 in VF-30, $4000 in XF-40. Over the years, I have found that an intermediate grade (in this case, “35”), while it may be numerically halfway between the two fixed grading points, will in fact command about an additional one- -3- third of the spread between the two values--or in the case of this coin, $3000. Coin Values quotes a generic 1794 Head of ‘94 in AU-50 at $5000. So, while there’s not total agreement by any means, in advance of the sale one would have pegged this coin as a $4000 coin, give or take 25%. And more to my point in this essay, the well-heeled variety collector bidder would have been competitive on this coin at such a level. Now, let’s look at a different situation: Lot 3016, the S-13. At the time of its examination at EAC San Diego, this was in a PCGS “20” slab. By the time of Wes’s sale, it had crossed over to an NGC “20” (The fact that it “crossed” at the same grade, given the direction of the crossover, might suggest implications to knowledgeable observers that I won’t go into here.) It was subsequently given an EAC grade of “15” for the catalog, which my own observation suggests was quite liberal. My own example of S-13, a Fine-12, has marginally less obverse sharpness than the Rasmussen coin; but it also lacks the multiple reverse scratches that the Rasmussen coin demonstrates. So I personally couldn’t grade Wes’s coin any higher than a “12.” Now this is a legitimately rare variety, and the only really collectable 1793 Liberty Cap, besides. Penny Prices puts a Fine-12 at $12,500. But Coin Values puts a VF-20 at $20,000. The general collector bidding on such a coin is far more likely to use the latter grade (and price) to guide his bidding. And such “type coin pressure” is going to make it hard for the EAC’er to compete without “overpaying.” And so the 1793 variety collector will necessarily settle for a lower-grade example. The Coin Values “G-4” at $2500 may not be as strictly graded as the Penny Prices G-5 at $2750, but at this grade level at least there isn’t a 60% variation between the two quotes! All of which tends to increase the demand for lower-grade examples among EAC collectors. My third example is the 1803 S-255, lot 3307. It’s EAC grade was VF-30, and in fact I found it quite comparable to my own “30” coin, purchased out of an EAC Sale a number of years -4- ago. It was given an NGC grade of AU-53. Now this variety, among its peers, is dirt-common. A VF-30 in Penny Prices is a $600 coin. But a generic AU 1803 in Coin Values is a $2000 coin. Which type of buyer, do you suspect, went for this one? Heritage’s description even pitched it to “date and type collectors”! I doubt an EAC variety collector would want to compete on this one; he or she recognizes that there’ll be another one just like it, somewhere down the line, at a far more favorable price. But again, the net effect is toward a greater awareness of variety collecting, as the EAC’er’s resources are husbanded for a better value elsewhere. As I wrote 18 years ago, it’s no longer possible to put together an extensive variety collection of early date cents, based upon cherrypicking unattributed coins, because the unattributed coins are few and far between. But the knowledge edge still exists, based on an awareness of real rarity, and what constitutes good value for any given grade, be that EAC “58” or “4.” I do suspect that the average grade of the coins included in extensive variety collections will continue to decline. This is not just a reflection of perceived value for the money spent, or the absolute level of prices; it also reflects the commercial pressure to get those unusually choice early date varieties that rate, say, an EAC “58” (at $6000) into a slab as “64 RB” (at $20,000+). All but a handful of EAC’ers will simply “cease to play” on those coins. But for many dates, a well-matched set of VF’s will continue to serve as both the variety collector’s aspiration, and a solid store of long-term value. * * * * * * * * * * * * * THE EARLY MINT FROM A DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVE. Bill Maryott When I graduated from college in 1967 as a Manufacturing Engineer, I was hired by IBM to work as a Quality and Reliability Engineer on Main Frame Storage Products. Today we all know them as computer hard drives. IBM recognized the need to provide hard drives for main frame computers that did not fail. Quality Assurance is a discipline developed over the past perhaps 100 years to provide defect free products. It involves disciplines such as statistical sampling, control charts, acceptable quality levels, inspections, screenings, stop shipments and today is an indispensable function in any manufacturing organization. Now suppose one wanted to study quality control in early nineteenth century manufacturing as our country was forming as a nation. The employees of that era are all gone, most of the manufacturing equipment and shop records are gone, and many of the products manufactured have disappeared. What product remains largely intact and is available for close scrutiny? It must be something manufactured in quantity and something that is kept even when it fails or is defective. The ideal product would be early American coins, especially large cents, because of the tremendously accurate information available on survivors. Coins have a way of being saved, hoarded, and passed down from generation to generation. Once they are sold to a coin dealer, they essentially become part of the known collector set and migrate from one -5- collection to another. Bill Noyes’ United States Large Cents with high quality pictures of both very fine coins and defective coins as a result of die failures is the key to this pursuit. By studying these coins, one can better understand the attitudes and practices used in early manufacturing in America. By understanding how things were manufactured and what was considered important, one may have a better appreciation of the resulting coins we so cherish. To begin this study, we need to understand the environment the coins were manufactured in and the skills of the employees. Some records do exist that gives us a sense of this environment. If you've read Craig Sholley’s and others’ writings on coin design and manufacturing, you will realize that die design, die engraving, die sinking, and coining were not simple. They involved 1,2 sophisticated design concepts and even more sophisticated metallurgical controls to work. We know the mint had a very few talented employees. David Rittenhouse, the first mint director, designed and manufactured clocks, precision scales, and a mechanism to show the movement of the planets in our solar system. We also know the employees worked under severe conditions. Long hours, six-day work weeks, poor lighting, hot sticky conditions in the summer and cold damp rooms in the winter. Yellow fever plagues, and the possibility of being closed down anytime were the terms of employment. From The Diary of Elizabeth Drinker who lived in 3 Philadelphia during this period and documented her daily life in a diary, we get a glimpse of what life was really like. She was constantly turning folks away who were looking for work. There was a surplus of unskilled labor and a real shortage of skilled workers. Let us now focus on design specifications. In a modern manufacturing organization, we have very explicit specifications. A die sinker would never put a fraction 1/000 on a coin because he would have an explicit drawing provided by a designer telling him exactly what to engrave. It's not likely that an early engraver would be trained in fractions and have a good understanding of what is correct as we all do today. The three errors reverse of 1801 S-218/219 would never happen today because the finished die would be independently inspected and approved before it was case hardened. The 1794 S-48 starred reverse would also have never happened. The die sinker that thought it cute to add a bunch of tiny stars to the design would have likely ended up swinging the weights on the large screw presses. If you've spent much time looking at nineteenth century writing, you will see that subscripts and superscripts are popular. Lined paper was rarely used and superscripts were common denoting letters missing. To their eye, the "fallen 4" in the 1794 S-63 would not look particularly out of place. The engraver was a bit short on space so he "dropped" the four. As for overstrikes, most of their writing was done with pen and ink. Erasures were not common nor popular. Normally a line would be drawn through the incorrect word and a new word written above. An overstrike, like we see on 1807 S-272, would not have looked particularly out of place as it does today. Dies were scarce and this was an easy and acceptable method of changing the date. As for schedules, we know the mint had quotas to meet. We know that costs were being very carefully controlled and the mint was expected to make enough coins to pay for their -6- operations. Looking at the surviving coins we know that many dies were used well beyond their 4 serviceable life just to continue production. The concept of pulling a die from production because it had ended its "expected" life would be unheard of. A die would be used until it actually broke into pieces. Since there was a shortage of dies and die breakage was a common occurrence, it is clear that shrink fit collars were designed and used to keep broken dies in service. I figured this out on my own by observing the reverse die of an 1803 S-263. (See Fig 1) The broken piece of the die was mispositioned such that one side was high and the other side low. This rework process is similar to the installation of iron rims on wooden wagon wheels. An iron sleeve or band is turned with an interference fit between the ID (inside diameter) of the sleeve and the OD (outside diameter) of the die. The sleeve would be heated redhot until it expands and is then slipped over the cold die and cooled. As the collar cools it shrinks tight onto the broken die holding the broken pieces in place. The compression force created by this method far exceeds the force created with locking collars, or a clamping scheme. I was amused later when I read in Lapp and Silberman's United States Large Cents 1793-1857 , page 124, as 5 follows: "Occasionally a die crack, contrary to all laws of logic and metallurgy will decrease rather than increase in size. The late Henry C. Hines discovered this peculiarity on some large cents and remained mystified until he learned that the damaged dies had been repaired by "sweating" a band of steel around them, thus diminishing the size of the cracks and adding to the useful life of the die." The message here is that old coins can talk. One just has to spend some time "listening" to them. Now let's talk about quality levels. Was there any pride in what the employees were making? I think the answer is clearly YES! A bright new shiny large cent hot off the press (and yes! they are extremely hot) would perhaps be the most sophisticated (or high tech) item a person owned, unless they happened to have a clock in their home. It was emblazoned with the words LIBERTY and UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and I suspect most everyone was proud to have one and carry it around in their pocket. If one looks at Walt Husak's collection of 1794 cents, one will see essentially perfect coins with just a few die breaks. Why no scratches, no keg -7- marks, nor rim bumps? I suspect the answer is that most of his coins may have been presentation pieces. Special coins recovered directly from the press to be given to someone probably as a souvenir. We know from the literature that this happened. Imagine if you asked for a souvenir coin today in the mint! What happened to the other production pieces? They were thrown in a wooden keg, rolled onto a wooden wheeled wagon with no suspension and drawn by horses across cobblestones for many miles. I'm guessing that Bill Noyes wouldn't have found even one AU50 in the keg after it's first arrival at the bank. Why do we see so many clipped planchets, overstrikes, weak strikes, and brockages? First one should remember the cent was worth one cent in copper. Many tokens and foreign coins were mixed with the US large cents in circulation and were accepted just as easily as true cents. For this reason, I would suspect brockages, off center, and even blank planchets would circulate just as easily as nice coins. I found it interesting that there were only six uncirculated coins in the entire Michael Arconti collection of mint errors. I'm always amazed at the defective coins in AG grade on Ebay that obviously circulated to near end of life with dramatic coining errors. As for counterstamps, imagine you run a little business in Philadelphia and everyone knew your name; why not just stamp your name on the cents as they are received. It will be a free advertisement every time the coin changes hands. The most amazing error coin that I'm aware of was the 1795 S-76A "massive pie pan" cent which sold as lot number 176 in the EAC 2002 Sale. (See Figure 2) As opposed to all the coins in the Arconti collection, this coin was not an error. It was clearly made by mint employees just "fooling around" trying to see how big they could make a large cent by continuous striking. It would never stack with other large cents so was surely just "pocketed" by an employee and taken from the mint to share with friends. It was not considered particularly important for many years because it was reduced to a VG10 coin by the time a numismaticist found it. What's so interesting today though, is the lack of quality controls. The mass production methods developed during the early 20th century were not to be developed or understood for at least another one hundred years. Interchangeability was not even a concept yet invented. Product specifications were vague and not well understood. The equipment used today to control the -8- coining process simply wasn't available. The dies cracked because the metallurgy, annealing, and case hardening processes couldn't be controlled. A minting operation involves close tolerances that today are monitored with micrometers, dial indicators, and vernier calipers. The early mint workers relied on very primitive instruments to control these operations. The metallurgy, dimensional controls, and annealing of the planchets and the dies are essential to make coining work. I would love to see some definitive analysis done on the early planchets to see the melt variability. I personally have noticed how differently the early coins especially 1795's, retone demonstrating they vary widely in chemical composition. The copper obviously has varying levels of zinc, tin and other elements all making coining difficult. To me personally, the fun of early large cents is to try to understand what life was like in the early 1800's when our country was newly formed. The large cents continue to go a long way telling that story. I leave it to others to collect slabbed MS64 gold or silver coins. Bibliography 1. Kleeberg, J. M.: America's Large Cents, The American Numismatic Society, 1998. 2. Cooper, Denis R.: The Art and Craft of Coinmaking. Spink and Son, 1988. 3. Crane, Elaine Forman: The Diary of Elizabeth Drinker, Northeastern University Press, 1994. 4. Durst, Sanford J.: History of the United States Mint and Coinage, Numismatic Publications, 1977. 5. Lapp, Warran A. and Herbert A. Silberman: United States Large Cents 1793-1857, Quarterman Publication, Inc, 1971. * * * * * * * * * * * * * EAC MEETING IN BUFFALO Nick Gampietro Meeting came to order at 11:30 on October 3, 2004, and lasted 45 minutes. The following attended: Nick Gampietro East Aurora, NY Ron Janowsky New Hartford, NY Harold Schwab Franklinville, NY Dauna Schwab Franklin Ville, NY Norm Peters Lancaster, NY George K. Pretsch Rochester, NY Todd Oliver Avoca, NY Jerry Shenck Lackawanna, NY (guest) Ken Bruboker Cheektowaga, NY -9- Discussed was Bob Grellman's book-later date large cents and using DRN to determine Newcomb numbers. Also discussed was the difference of the 1793-1814 Noyes Book vs. The Breen Book. Everyone agreed that the Noyes pictures were better with more detail. One of the members bought a complete date collection from 1793-1814 that he had just purchased. The 1793, 1799, 1804 grading out to G5 to VG10. We discussed how someone in the group found an S-80 counterfeit coin. It graded out to XF+. An explanation was given that, after much research, it was discovered that it had been copied from the plate coin in the Breen Book. Ron Janowsky and George Pretsch described Mexican coppers, since both collected them. Members passed around some other large cents – another 1799 graded 12/6 and a rare 1835 N-19 graded 20/10+. Norm Peters and Ron Janowsky suggested that we try to have another meeting in the spring. We would like to thank the (BNA) Buffalo Numismatic Association for donating a room to us for this meeting during their two-day convention. * * * * * * * * * * * * Early American Coppers, Inc. 2005 Annual Convention and Show April 21-24, 2005 • Annapolis, MD The 2001 EAC Convention will be held at the Radisson Hotel Annapolis, 210 Holiday Court, Annapolis, MD 21401 (800) 266-7631. The hotel is recently renovated and is beautiful and convenient both to Baltimore-Washington International Airport and to the historic district of Annapolis. We have reserved a block of rooms. Remember that the charge to EAC for use of the bourse and meeting rooms depends on the number of rooms we use during the convention. Be sure to reserve a room before March 30, 2005. On that date our reserved block of rooms may be rented to others. To reach the hotel, see the directions on the following page. We expect over fifty participating dealers. The Bourse will open at 10:00 AM on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It will close at 5:00 PM on Friday and Saturday and at 3:00 PM on Sunday. Lots to be sold in the Saturday night EAC Sale will be available for viewing from 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The educational program, organized and scheduled by Chuck Heck, promises to be one of the best ever. Once again, Thursday morning will feature the EAC Grading and Counterfeit Detection Seminar presented by Doug Bird and Steve Carr. The educational program events will be held Friday and Saturday. The traditional wine and cheese hospitality reception will be held on Thursday night, and we hope to have a special treat for everyone. Donations to support this reception will be greatly appreciated and should be mailed to Convention Chairman Bill Eckberg at the address below. The Colonial, Half Cent and Large Cent Happenings will follow the reception. Annapolis’ location and history provides opportunities for numerous interesting day trips. John Kraljevich tentatively scheduled a tour of the United States Naval Academy and some other sites of historical interest as well as a “spouse tour”. In addition, there is a discussion of getting a few -10-