Welcome to The E-Sylum: Volume 3, Number 3 January 16, 2000: an electronic publication of the Numismatic Bibliomania Society. SUBSCRIBER UPDATES We have two new subscribers this week: Ed Price and Jim N. Welcome aboard! Also, thanks to a couple helpful subscribers, Mike Grogan is back in the fold. This brings our subscriber count to 272. NBS AT F.U.N. (FLORIDA UNITED NUMISMATISTS) Fred Lake reports: "The show went very well and Bill Murray ran a fine NBS meeting." The following notes are excerpted from Bill's meeting report: "Twenty-one persons were in attendance, nine of whom were NBS members. The highlight of the meeting was Fred Lake's presentation, "What Books You Should Buy to Know What Books You Should Buy." Fred showed several well known and not so well known bibliographies and evaluated each as well as giving specifics as to how one might use, or perhaps ignore, each when involved in numismatic research. " PUBLISHING NBS MEETING PROGRAMS Darryl Atchison of County Cork, Ireland writes: "Is there any chance you can get a copy of the text from Fred Lake's talk at FUN regarding 'Which books to buy...' and have it posted to me? I would be glad to reimburse any postage costs incurred. Alternatively, may I make a better suggestion that some of these fabulous talks - including this one - that are given at 'NBS' meetings be published in the Asylum. With a worldwide membership, it seems a shame that only a hardcore, dedicated group which always seems able to travel to these conventions (i.e. ANA, ANS, etc.) are able to partake of the expertise which is passed along at these meetings. No doubt the George Kolbe's and Charles Davis' of this world could just as easily have presented talks on the same subject as Fred, but for us people who are not quite as up-to-speed as these fellows, these talks provide us with a valuable insight and useful guidelines which assist us in our research and collecting." Actually, Fred has indeed submitted a some notes from his talk, which we plan to publish in first number of the year 2000 volume of The Asylum. 1817 MINT REPORT From the 1817 report of Mint Director R. Patterson to President James Madison: "The repairs of the Mint, which you were pleased to authorize, are now nearly completed. A substantial brick building has been erected on the site formerly occupied by an old wooden building; and in the apparatus and arrangement of machinery, which have been adopted, many important improvements have been introduced. Among these is the substitution of a steam-engine, for the horse-power heretofore employed. A change which it is believed, will not only diminish the expenses of the establishment, but greatly facilitate all its principal operations." PRINTING THE E-SYLUM Harold Welch writes: "I have taken to printing the E-Sylum - one problem is that it prints with a very narrow margin on the left and a very wide one on the right. This causes considerable difficulty if you want to bind it, or even three ring punch it. Can the left margin be set wider?" So cyberspace bumps up against the real world. Well, I could try something like that, but it's hard to please everyone. A better source for printing would be the archived versions of The E-Sylum on our web site. It's not up to date, but ultimately all back issues will be posted there and can be printed with wider margins. Go to http://www.coinbooks.org/ and click on "E-Sylum Archive" GREATER THAN GREAT (EXCEPT FOR THE BINDING) One book on bank history offered this week on ebay is described by its seller as follows: "The book is in great conditon for its age. The inside is great, better then great. and the outside cover is good the middle binding is starting to give way." SEEING DOUBLE In response to the story about the double-printed article, Pete Smith writes: "I was going to submit something about Brad Karoleff's column in Coin World but you got there first. My copy also has his column printed twice. I wonder if that represents a new type of literature error and if that issue will become a collector's item." With tongue planted firmly in cheek, Ken Bressett writes: "We have all been worried about the Y2K threat, and now it is evident that the worst has happened. Two Brad Karoleffs is more than anyone should have to endure. Is it possible that this is a sign of the beginning of the end of the world? Or has it happened and this is our punishment for past numismatic sins!?" William T. Gibbs, COIN World News Editor writes: "Brad's column appeared twice due to a computer-generated production error (completely unrelated to Y2K, I hasten to add). Brad's second column replaced Gerald Tebben's column, which we are running in the Jan. 24 issue. Jerry Tebben took the mistake well. He's an editor at the Columbus Dispatch, so he understands how these things happen." ANOTHER SENSELESS COIN MUTILATION Chuck Shepherd's syndicated "News of the Weird" column describes this eyewitness account from the Oaklahoman newspaper: "Cowboy Pat Ratliff, age 78, won $1,700 from three marks in Ardmore, Okla., by tearing a quarter in half. To erase skepticism, Ratliff also took two quarters from the reporter and tore those in half, each in less than 30 seconds." Can any of you manly bibliophiles top that feat? (Tearing books in half doesn't count - besides it's frowned upon in our circles). Speaking of mutilated coins, the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh has an 1878 medal issued by the Western Pennsylvania Numismatic Society. The medal appears to have been shot through the center with a bullet, leaving only the outer rim intact. The key to why on earth this piece came to rest in the museum may be found in the following item, taken from the history of the WPNS. Sometimes the oddest things can be explained with a little library research... The medal was struck in the founding year of the society, and commemorates the 1878 Pittsburg Exposition. An advertisement for the event in the August 24, 1878 Pittsburgh Commercial Gazette notes: "In addition to a vast display in the provinces of Art, Mechanics, Agriculture, Floriculture, Inventions, &c, There will be the following SPECIAL ATTRACTIONS, Which have been secured by the management without regard to expense: Dr. W. F. Carver, will exhibit his prodigious skill as a rifleman daily, illustrating his marvelous powers by breaking glass balls in the air, cutting coins, lead pencils &c., using a Winchester Rifle." FEATURED WEB SITE This week's featured web page is the History section from the Western Pennsylvania Numismatic Society's web site (authored by yours truly several years ago). WPNS was founded in 1878 and the Society continues to meet monthly. http://www.coinlibrary.com/wpns/club_wpns_history.html Wayne Homren Numismatic Bibliomania Society The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. For more information please see our web site at http://www.coinbooks.org/ There is a membership application available on the web site. To join, print the application and return it with your check to the address printed on the application. For those without web access, contact Dave Hirt, NBS Secretary-Treasurer, 5911 Quinn Orchard Road, Frederick, MD 21701 (To be removed from this mailing list write to me at whomren@coinlibrary.com)
