It is with immense sadness that I announce the death on 18 May 2018 of Jean-Baptiste Giard, former curator of the Paris coin cabinet, author of many books and articles among which two volumes of the museum's catalogue of Roman coins. His funerals will take place in Paris on 1 June 2018.

The exhibition is on until the 30th September and is sponsored by Spink.

Thanks for the review of my book in The E-Sylum last week. In addition to basing my book on my own collection, I read everything in the the Club archives. I also interviewed senior members of the Club and other collectors. I felt the book covered everything produced by the Club. So I was very surprised when I read your comment about having information on two items the Club produced that I did not list.

Then it struck me that you are probably referring to award medals that I touched upon in Appendix A. As I mention in the second paragraph of the Appendix - “it is not my intent to list all the award medals....”. I then go on to mention two medals produced by Medallic Art. Regardless of what you are referring to, I would appreciate you sharing any information you have on any medal produced for the Club.

With your information I will update the Club archives and inform the members.

The article about the 1964 Morgan Dollar in the May 13th issue reminded me of a book I recently picked up at a local antique mall. The attached photo shows the cover. This book has a copyright date of 1964. I was a little excited to see the center image and see what they had to say. The surprising thing to me that despite the prominent "New Peace Dollar" on the cover it was never mentioned in the contents. I read the entire contents hoping to find what the news was. It was actually a neat little book that I believe was geared towards new collectors.

It left me wondering about the circumstances that caused them to feature it on the cover and then never address it again. I know that there were rumors about 1964 Peace Dollars existing and that PCGS has offered a reward for submitting one.

It is true the medal is quite common. The English copies, 150,000 of them, are struck in iron. Originals were cast, in iron and bronze. There are two varieties, one reading "5 MAY" and a second with "MAY" corrected to the German "MAI". The box is much scarcer than the medal but not at all scarce. An example with the box still nice and the leaflet enclosed? Scarce, not rare. I believe there are variant leaflets, for different charities.

There is also an American copy, in a glossy grey leaden material. It is 5-10 times scarcer than the British copy. It was issued in a printed envelope, which is not so often present.

What happens when the match is on a neutral territory?

Good Question, particularly for International Tournaments. When a match is played in a neutral territory like when games were not possible in Pakistan there is still a host. Not sure why in a few game series they don't alternate after the first match to average out any ground bias.

I have done the first session at a school with real, live kids and it went very well. My program is to create a desire to collect coins from just regular kids the age we were when we got started -- high school basically. The hobby needs new kids -- and who knows, they may bring Dad or Mom into the hobby -- I did in the 1960s!

I am happy to forward material to interested people and see what they can share.

On Friday I opened an envelope postmarked Dallas, TX. There was name and address of the sender. Inside was a handwritten letter from a lady who said that her husband was in the final days of his life and wanted to take care of something that had been bothering him for most of his life. Fifty years ago, she said, he stole a book from me. She enclosed a $20 bill from him to give to me.

Today at church I gave the $20 to our pastor, told her the story, and asked her to keep it on hand to give anonymously to some little kid for whom it would be a wondrous gift.

Bernard von NotHaus
Experience your inner spirituality with just one toke...

Experience

Cannabis Spiritual Center
Founder
Company Name Cannabis Spiritual Center
Dates Employed Apr 2017 – Present
Employment Duration 1 yr 2 mos
Location Malibu, CA

Liberty Dollar
Monetary Architect
Company Name Liberty Dollar
Dates Employed Oct 1998 – Present
Employment Duration 19 yrs 8 mos

Post a 100 Word comment about your cannabis spiritual experience on the Blog and we will send the One Toke to God book to you.