The report on the glorious 1910 pattern gold crown of King George V highlights a significant constitutional issue. The new monarch becomes ruler the moment his or her predecessor dies. Legally the throne is never vacant, but traditionally the Coronation follows a year of state mourning and in effect ceremonially ratifies the succession that has already been achieved. It would have been in poor taste to strike any coin for George V bearing the date of his father's death.

Yes, George V became King on 6th May 1910, the same day his father died. But only for 15 minutes of that day as Edward VII died at 11.45 P.M. I don’t actually know if it was considered bad taste to use the year of death of the previous monarch but the first coins of a reign were dated with the coronation year throughout the 20th century. You would probably have to ask the Royal Mint for the official position.

I thought it would be a good idea to keep this topic targeted on numismatic books. This encased PEI cent was issued in 1988 to commemorate The release of The Currency and Medals of Prince Edward Island by Robert J. Graham, Earle K. Kennedy, J. Richard Becker. I believe they were presented to contributors and authors.

I recall attending the 1954 ANA convention in Cleveland, Ohio. People had gathered around McDermott who pulled the 1913 Liberty Head Nickel OUT OF HIS POCKET !! Claimed he had paid $10,000 for it. Never heard of a coin selling for that much at the time.

Hooray for Howard Daniel III. Nice news item and well deserved recognition.

Ron Abler, in his catalog of Centennial medals (www.centennialmedals.com), lists several reverse varieties of A. Demarest’s "Declaration of Independence" medal but not this one. I have no information on the U.S. Medallion Advertising Company, which was located on the same block of Broadway as Demarest. However, Ron illustrates a newspaper ad for a U.S. Medallion Company at 212 Broadway, offering "Centennial Memorial Medals" and depicting the Demarest obverse. The 42mm medal is struck in white metal.

We have a new component to our website, and while it isn’t numismatic in nature, it deals with a pre-revolutionary event that might interest your readers who collect Colonial American coins and medals.