“Near Spilsby’ Hoard of Roman Coins to be shared with Lincolnshire youngsters and museum

Oct 3, 2017 | News

The London Mint Office, who sell commemorative coins celebrating global historic events and milestones, shares its latest historic collection with The Collection Museum in Lincoln and schools in Lincolnshire, allowing the general public and local school children the chance to see some of the famous 1,700 years old ‘Near Spilsby’ Hoard of Roman coins.

Hand selected coins will be donated to local Spilsby schools to support the curriculum on the Roman Empire, where the coins will be used as a teaching resource to further pupils’ understanding of coinage, why it was important and how significant it was for the region in the Roman period, which is particularly pertinent since the coins were found nearby. In addition, and as recognition of the historical context of the discovery, a portion of the coins will also be donated to The Collection Museum in Lincoln city centre as a permanent reminder of the area’s rich Roman heritage.

The mainly bronze hoard was discovered in 2014 on farmland in Lincolnshire by two metal detectorists, and purchased at auction by The London Mint Office, a company at the very centre of British coin collecting. The coins feature Roman emperor Constantine the Great and members of his family, and would have been buried in the ground near Spilsby around 340 AD by an owner who never returned for them.

Managing Director of The London Mint Office, Greg Prosser said: “It’s a rare thing for a complete secret hoard to be found, and this one remained hidden for many centuries. This hoard tells a fantastic story, from its burial right the way through to the find. Our business is based on offering coin collections to a wide audience, so we are now really excited to share this extraordinary discovery with the Lincolnshire public, and with youngsters, to really capture their imaginations and bring history into the classroom.”

The majority of the coins were produced in Roman mints at Arles, Lyon and Trier, while some were struck at the ancient Roman cities of Siscia and Aquileia as well as Rome.

A New Book for the Serious Coin Collector: Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace

Sep 18, 2017 | News

by Dennis Tucker

“Buy the book before the coin” is good, solid, often-quoted advice for newcomers to the hobby. Frankly, it’s guidance for a lifetime of collecting; we should all heed it well beyond the beginner stage. And fortunately for today’s hobbyist, this advice has never been easier to follow—thanks in large part to one incredibly productive author, Q. David Bowers.

Numismatic publishing has experienced a renaissance, an exciting boom, over the past 15 years. Dave Bowers joined forces with Whitman Publishing in 2003 as the company’s numismatic director and as research editor of the Book of United States Coins (the hobby’s best-selling annual price guide and reference, known everywhere as the “Red Book”). He had been a Red Book contributor for years before that, and had helped with other Whitman projects. But it was in 2003 that the relationship was formalized—if a handshake agreement can be called “formal”—and things really took off.

I joined Whitman Publishing myself the following year, as the company’s publisher. I’ve been a coin collector since around age seven, and like any good collector I owned a number of well-read Bowers books, most of them bought directly from his company (at the time, Bowers and Merena Galleries) when I was in my teens and early twenties. Among the Bowers books that traveled with me from my little hometown of Phoenix, New York, to college in Rochester, and later to Atlanta, were his 1987 monograph The Strange Career of Dr. Wilkins: A Numismatic Inquiry; the 1988 reprint of his 1964 classic, Coins and Collectors; and the 13th (!) edition of High Profits From Rare Coin Investment (1991).

Working With Mr. Bowers

By the time I started working for Whitman Publishing, Q. David Bowers was a world-famous numismatist with decades of experience. Several hugely successful companies had his good name attached to them as a founder and officer. He had served as president of the Professional Numismatists Guild and of the American Numismatic Association. His track record as a dealer and auctioneer included selling many of the finest, most valuable, and most historic coin collections ever assembled. For years I (and many other fans) had read his Coin World column, “The Joys of Collecting.” He’d been named as one of only six living people in a roster of eighteen “Numismatists of the Century” in a 1999 poll conducted by COINage magazine. And as a book author he had a long shelf of numismatic titles to his credit, many of them best sellers.

I remember my first conversation with “Mr. Bowers” (as I addressed him a couple times), made by phone because he was in New Hampshire and I was in Georgia. Finally he said, “If you keep calling me ‘Mr. Bowers,’ I’ll have to call you ‘Mr. Tucker.’” From that point on it was “Dave,” as he prefers it, as relaxed and down-to-earth as can be.

Since then I’ve emailed Dave or spoken with him on the phone nearly every day, and we’ve published dozens of new “QDB” books ranging from 96-page monographs to 900-page encyclopedias (plus several editions of the 1,504-page Mega Red, for which he serves as research editor).

Here are some thoughts on the development of his latest book, Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace, which will debut in October 2017, and where it stands in the Bowers oeuvre.

The Expert’s Guide

In 1999 Whitman Publishing had released an excellent new book by Kenneth Bressett, longtime editor of the Red Book. His Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting quickly established itself as a popular introduction to the world of numismatics. In my first year at Whitman, one of my big projects with Dave Bowers was another new book that might be placed on the other end of the hobby spectrum. Its title is The Expert’s Guide to Collecting and Investing in Rare Coins. Because of its sheer size (688 pages) it’s tempting to characterize the Expert’s Guide as a book reserved for advanced collectors. In reality, this was (and is) a volume for everyone with a serious interest in the hobby, whether new or old. As Dave wrote in his introduction:

“It is never too early or too late to discover coins and the other delights that make up the world of collecting. If you are a preteen, welcome! Similarly, if you are in retirement, welcome! Numismatics knows no restrictions of age, race, religion, politics, or anything else.”

The Expert’s Guide was a monumental undertaking, compiling Dave’s 50-plus years of hobby/industry experience in 34 chapters of engaging prose with more than 1,300 illustrations. We released it in October of 2005 with much fanfare, including mainstream publicity in the Wall Street Journal. Collectors immediately fell in love with the book, and it earned strong reviews:

• “Dave Bowers is uniquely qualified to write this book,” said Clifford Mishler, retired chairman of Krause Publications. “He brings proper balance to the interplay of collecting and investing in our hobby community.”
• Ken Bressett, who wrote its foreword, asked rhetorically, “Are there really ‘secrets’ to successful coin buying? You bet! And Dave Bowers reveals them. His style is entertaining, informative, and motivating. The profits you will accrue from reading this book extend far beyond the monetary.”
• Bill Fivaz, coauthor of the Cherrypickers’ Guide to Rare Die Varieties of United States Coins, said, “If there’s a single person who could write this book, it’s Dave Bowers”—and he jokingly opined that the prolific author’s next book would be The History of the World!

Dave tells me that of all his books, the Expert’s Guide is the one that generates the most enthusiastic letters and emails from readers. He likens reading it and absorbing its lessons to getting a master’s degree in numismatics. Sales numbers confirm its popularity: Whitman has sold tens of thousands of copies since 2005.

Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace

About 10 years later we were planning on updating Ken Bressett’s Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting, by then well established and popularly known as the “Yellow Book.” It had been reprinted several times over the years and was ready for a new edition. As I studied our publishing list and talked with our sales team (who interact every day with collectors nationwide), I noted that we have the Yellow Book as a beginner’s introduction to coin collecting, and the 688-page Expert’s Guide for more advanced students of numismatics. Was there an opportunity for a companion to these two titles—specifically, a book for intermediate collectors who have devoured the Yellow Book and the Red Book, and want to continue expanding their knowledge?

Knowing the hobby community and the needs and interests of collectors, I strongly believed the answer was “yes.”

To that end, this year’s harvest of new Whitman books includes:

• for hobby newcomers, the freshly revised, updated, and expanded new edition of the Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting, which debuted in July 2017, and
• for continuing students of the art and science of numismatics, Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace: Secrets to Being a Smart Buyer will be available in October.

With each book you get more and more information to add to your storehouse of numismatic knowledge.

In Bressett’s Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting, a newcomer will learn about coin collecting as a hobby; reasons people collect coins; coins as historical documents; how coins are made; where to find them; what factors affect their value; and the basics of grading coins, studying them, storage and display, maintaining a collection, and other points of interest.

Bowers’s Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace tells you how to successfully navigate the numismatic marketplace and find high-quality coins; how to build a great collection; and ways to explore new highways and byways of the hobby. Dave shares wit and wisdom from his experiences as a professional coin dealer, today adding up to 60-plus years in numismatics.

Bressett’s Yellow Book offers, among other resources, an illustrated catalog of all U.S. coins by type. Chapter 3 of Bowers’s Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace does as well, but with a more in-depth approach, and many more photographs. The information is compiled with the goal of making you a smarter buyer of high-quality coins, no matter which series you collect.

In chapter 4 Dave shares stories about colonial and early American coins and tokens, treasure-ship coins, commemoratives, private and territorial gold pieces, numismatic books, historical medals, counterstamps, and other specialties. Many of these subjects are introduced on a basic level in the Yellow Book; in Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace they’re given more analysis, with case studies; and in the Expert’s Guide most of them get even deeper coverage in their own individual full-length chapters.

Chapter 5 introduces dozens of numismatic personalities from yesterday and today, many of whom Dave knew personally, and gives a history of the rare-coin market and its historical cycles. Chapter 6 offers a guided tour down memory lane, with the author sharing his recollections of the marketplace in a “personal scrapbook.”

My hope for Inside the Rare Coin Marketplace is that, whether you’re a fresh face in the hobby or have been around a while, you’ll learn something new, you’ll pick up a few good “coin stories” to share with friends and family, you’ll discover ways to sharpen and hone your collecting habits and strategies, and—of course, because this is a Dave Bowers book—you’ll be thoroughly entertained along the way.

Good Photos of Bad Coins: An Example of Crowdsourcing and Numismatic Publishing

Sep 16, 2017 | News

by Dennis Tucker

What’s the state of numismatic publishing today? Coin collectors are spoiled! Or at least it feels like we are when it comes to photographs in numismatic books, compared to fifteen or twenty years ago and more. Full color, high resolution, and visual perfection are the order of the day for 21st-century hobbyists.

In Whitman Publishing books, coin collectors are used to seeing beautifully preserved Mint State coins—well-struck examples that illustrate types, dates, and die varieties with crisp detail and generous eye appeal.

Earlier this year, though, we took a road less traveled.

In February 2017 I put out a call for “problem coins” to illustrate some of the educational warnings author Kenneth Bressett gives in his new Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting. I asked hobbyists for high-resolution photographs of PVC damage, bag marks, scratches, edge bumps, nicks, dents, and other problems caused by poor handling or storage.

The call for cull coins quickly spread throughout the hobby community. Publications like Coin World, Numismatic News, The Numismatist, E-Sylum, Coin Update, Mint News Blog, Scott Barman’s Coin Collectors Blog, and Coins Weekly helped get the word out.

When Numismatic News editor Dave Harper saw our request for damaged coins, he remembered a painfully educational experience. “There are many problem coins out there,” he noted in his column. “Collectors cannot be collectors for long without encountering them.” He recalled a 1940-D Washington quarter he bought when he was a child. After he got the coin in the mail he took it out of its stapled 2×2 holder—and that’s when he saw the deep gouge in its rim. The seller had a “no returns” policy for coins removed from their holders, so Harper was stuck with the damaged quarter. “Problem coins are educational,” he wrote in his column. “I was educated by one. I expect other collectors have been, too.”

In the new Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting, author Ken Bressett—longtime senior editor of the Guide Book of United States Coins, known as the “Red Book”—tells about the dangers of storing coins in polyvinyl-chloride (PVC) holders; the correct ways to handle coins; proper storage and display; and ways to avoid damage to our collections.

Instead of simply telling about the risks and dangers, we decided to show them.

I talked with dozens of collectors from across the United States and Canada, and all together they shared photographs of more than 300 coins.

Syd Martin contributed a Lincoln cent found on the beach, with saltwater damage from exposure to the elements. David Luftig shared a box of Liberty Seated silver coins, all of them stained, holed, scratched, or otherwise damaged. Mike Angelo has an 1807 Draped Bust dime with a wavy indentation, as if someone had tried to bend it.

Professional numismatist Jim Bucki, who writes for The Spruce, shared some frighteningly detailed photographs of advanced PVC damage. The close-ups on page 90 are enough to make you run to your safe-deposit box to double-check all your plastic coin flips and make sure they’re not made of this numismatically dangerous plastic. Cody Charlton also shared photos of milder (but still unpleasant) green hazing caused by PVC exposure.

Stack’s Bowers Galleries contributed photographs of an 1865 copper-nickel three-cent coin sprinkled with a rash of flyspecks across Miss Liberty’s face. These are small black dots that can emerge over time if you breathe or sneeze on a coin, leaving moisture on its surface.

Jon Roche shared photographs of a 1909-S Indian Head cent with Extremely Fine details marred by corrosion, giving Miss Liberty a bad case of chickenpox on her neck and chin. (He told me that it sold on eBay for less than the Red Book value for the same coin in undamaged Good-4 condition.)

From author and educator Bill Fivaz came photographs of an otherwise Mint State Eisenhower dollar with fingerprints on both sides. Bill noted that the coin was part of an Uncirculated Mint Set, still in its sealed cellophane envelope—so much for being “untouched by human hands”! It’s a good example of how fingerprints might not be noticeable at first, but will eventually show up clearly (and sadly, for the owner) on a coin’s delicate surface.

Some of the crowdsourced coins had been defaced deliberately: Bob Evans has an 1855-S gold double eagle recovered from the wreck of the SS Central America. Some nineteenth-century doodler scratched a pipe clenched between Miss Liberty’s lips, like Granny Clampett smoking a corncob. You’ll see it on page 244. Tom Koolick shared photos of a Buffalo nickel that was notched on its rim, perhaps to be secured into a necklace pendant. Collectors sent us photographs of valuable old coins made worthless by having holes drilled into them. This might have been done to fashion a button, or simply to pass the time with some mindless tinkering.

Other contributors whose photographs were used in the Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting include Kevin Day-Thorburn, Phil Iversen, and Isaiah Hageman.

Our thanks to everyone who wrote to offer their photographs for publication. It was fun hearing your stories and seeing your coins—they might be less than perfect, but they’re still educational. As the old saying goes, “Nobody is completely worthless. You can always serve as a bad example!”

The 288-page softcover Whitman Guide to Coin Collecting debuted July 4, 2017, and is now available from booksellers and hobby shops nationwide, and online (including at www.Whitman.com), for $12.95. It officially debuted at the American Numismatic Association World’s Fair of Money in Denver, August 1–5, 2017.

The guide, popularly known as the “Yellow Book,” includes chapters on coin collecting as a hobby; places to find coins; how coins are made; venues to learn about collecting; getting started as a collector; caring for a coin collection; grading techniques and standards; coin prices and values; commemoratives, bullion, special coin issues, counterfeits, medals, tokens, casino chips, and more.

Whitman Publishing Releases Expanded New Edition of A Guide Book of Lincoln Cents

Sep 7, 2017 | News

(Pelham, Alabama)—Whitman Publishing has released an expanded, updated second edition of its best-selling Guide Book of Lincoln Cents, a popular entry in the Bowers Series of numismatic titles. The book continues in the tradition of the Guide Book of Morgan Silver Dollars and other Bowers Series guides, now numbering more than two dozen volumes. The 320-page full-color book is available online (including at Whitman.com) and from booksellers nationwide for $19.95.

Generations of coin collectors have grown up with the Lincoln cent, America’s longest-running coin series, first minted in 1909. Author Q. David Bowers, the nation’s most widely published numismatic writer, provides a detailed study of this American classic, including history, grading, market values, and more. Lincoln cents are illustrated in full color, with high-resolution enlargements for important doubled dies and other varieties. Mintages, specifications, and retail values in multiple grades (including Brown, Red/Brown, and Red Mint State) add to the book’s reference value. More than 750 photographs illustrate the text.

“Lincoln cents are an evergreen coin series,” said Whitman publisher Dennis Tucker. “They’re fun and easy to collect, but they also offer challenges for the advanced hobbyist. Collectors bought tens of thousands of copies of the first edition of the Guide Book of Lincoln Cents. We know the second edition will be just as popular.”

On the technical and production side, A Guide Book of Lincoln Cents covers die preparation, design modifications, the coining process, distribution, Proofs, mintmarks, doubled dies, and other specialized topics. An appendix by specialist Fred Weinberg discusses errors and misstruck cents.

On the market side, the book explains how to specialize in Lincoln cents, and gives advice on determining authenticity, analyzing color and strike, being a smart buyer, realities of the marketplace, comparative rarities, Full Details, certification, establishing fair market prices, and more.

New to the second edition are full coverage of the 2009 cents minted for the bicentennial of Abraham Lincoln’s birth; an appendix on pattern cents; an illustrated overview of Abraham Lincoln medals and tokens, based on the research of historian Fred Reed; a study of Lincoln portraiture from the 1800s to date, also based on Reed’s work; and a gallery of alternative 2009 Bicentennial coin designs that were reviewed by the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee. The second edition also has a two-page index, and a new foreword by Joel Iskowitz, who designed the 2009 “Professional Life in Illinois” cent. The book has also been updated with new pricing and research. It is 16 pages longer than the first edition.

“Writing this book has been very enjoyable,” author Dave Bowers said. “It has reinforced my continuous belief that Lincoln cents are among the most fascinating coins in the entire American series.”