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About Us The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit association devoted to the study and enjoyment of numismatic literature. For more information please see our web site at coinbooks.org Subscriptions Those wishing to become new E-Sylum subscribers can go to the following web page Subscribe You may Unsubscribe Here Membership There is a membership application available on the web site Membership Application To join, print the application and return it with your check to the address printed on the application. Print/Digital membership is $40 to addresses in the U.S., and $60 elsewhere. A digital-only membership is available for $25. For those without web access, write to: Jeff Dickerson, Treasurer Numismatic Bibliomania Society P. O. Box 578, Weatherford, TX 76086 Asylum For Asylum mailing address changes and other membership questions, contact Jeff at this email address: treasurer@coinbooks.org Submissions To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com BUY THE BOOK BEFORE THE COIN Sale Calendar June 13, 2026 - Kolbe & Fanning

 

Content presented in The E-Sylum is not necessarily researched or independently fact-checked, and views expressed do not necessarily represent those of the Numismatic Bibliomania Society.

WAYNE'S WORDS: THE E-SYLUM MAY 31, 2026

New subscribers this week include: Jonathan Deller and Richard Tritz. Welcome aboard! We now have 6,477 subscribers.

Thank you for reading The E-Sylum. If you enjoy it, please send me the email addresses of friends you think may enjoy it as well and I'll send them a subscription. Contact me at whomren@gmail.com anytime regarding your subscription, or questions, comments or suggestions about our content.

This week we open with a new offering from numismatic literature dealer Charlie Davis, more Kolbe & Fanning sale selections, the IAPN book prizes, three obituaries, updates from the Newman Numismatic Portal, and more.

Other topics this week include error coins, the Higgins Museum, space metal, the Clemens family of collectors, SS Central America wreck inhabitants, Ken Bressett, auction previews, the May 2026 PAN show, Tinnahs, card money, and that $250 Trump banknote.

To learn more about Michael Mitchiner, Oriental coins in the British Museum, Pope Pius IX medals, life-saving gold coins, Latin American tokens, Karl Kress, the Quezon-Roosevelt Peso, A.M. Tracey Woodward, the United Steamship Company, Encased Postage Stamps, Great American Coin Hoards, and Lt. Dixon's Lucky Double Eagle, read on. Have a great week, everyone!

Wayne Homren
Editor, The E-Sylum

 

MICHAEL MITCHINER BOOKS AVAILABLE

Numismatic literature dealer Charles Davis writes:

 

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KOLBE & FANNING SALE 177 HIGHLIGHTS

Kolbe & Fanning Numismatic Booksellers are holding our 177th auction sale on Saturday, June 13, 2026. The sale features a variety of rare and out-of-print works on ancient, world and U.S. numismatics, accompanied by the extraordinary library on orders and decorations formed by James C. Risk.

Some highlights of the sale include:

 

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IAPN 2026 BOOK PRIZES ANNOUNCED

Here are the results of the IAPN 2026 Book Prize, decided by vote of the membership at its 75th General Assembly in Rome on Sunday 24 May. This year 27 books were entered for the Prize, 4 from Asia, 16 from Europe and 7 from North America.

The clear winner, with 92 points, was Stefano Bertuzzi, for his 3-volume magnum opus, Corpus Numismatum Omnium Romanorum Pontificum: Pio IX nelle medaglie, nelle croci capitolari e nella faleristica [Corpus Numismatum Omnium Romanorum Pontificum: Pius IX in medals, capitular crosses and phaleristics], published by Edizioni D'Andrea in Rome.

In second place, with 41 points, was Daniel Sedwick, for Arce's Doubloons: A die study of the Colombian gold cob coinage of assayer Arce in the name of Charles II, 1692-1714, published by Sedwick & Associates, Winter Park, FL. In third place, with 39 points, was Sir Mark Jones, for William Wyon, published by Spink in London.

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BYERS WORLD'S GREATEST ERRORS BOOK AVAILABLE

Mike Byers writes:

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RON DUTTON (1935-2026)

Founder member and a Vice President of BAMS and of the International Art Medal Federation. Exhibited extensively in solo and group exhibitions in the UK and abroad. A major retrospective was held at the Royal Coin Cabinet of Sweden in 2004.

Work is in many international public and private collections and commissioned medals undertaken for private and public clients including The Royal Mint and The British Museum.

Many articles written by Dutton have appeared in The Medal, the journal of the British Art Medal Society and critiques and comment on his work have been included in many other journals.

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KENT MORRIS FROSETH (1936-2026)

Kent Morris Froseth, age 90, of Bloomington, passed away on May 15th, 2026. He was preceded in death by his parents, Charles and Norah Froseth, his wife, Nancy and his brother, Dan.

Kent was the owner of KM Froseth Inc., a respected coin company he led for nearly 40 years. He was a member of the Professional Numismatists Guild (PNG) since 1988 and the International Association of Professional Numismatics (IAPN). His work took him around the world attending coin shows, and he often brought his family along to share in the experience and create lasting memories.

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DAVID E. HENKLE (1937-2026)

David Eldred Henkle passed away after suffering cardiac arrest on May 12, 2026 at St. Joseph Regional Medical Center in Mishawaka, IN. He was born in Urbana, IL on June 19, 1937 to Herman Henry Henkle and Genevieve Evelyn Henkle.

A 1955 graduate of Highland Park High School in Illinois, David retired in 1975, at the rank of Master Sergeant, after twenty years in the U.S. Army as a ballistic missile specialist. He served several tours in Germany, Korea, Okinawa and other U.S. Army Nike Bases.

A coin collector starting when he was 10 years old, David spent the last decades of his life as an avid collector of tokens of Africa, Latin America and the West Indies.

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NEWMAN PORTAL ADDS KEN BRESSETT INTERVIEW

Ken Bressett, Interviewed by Greg Bennick

In this oral history interview, legendary numismatist Ken Bressett reflects on a lifetime in coin collecting that began in the 1930s with Indian cents, B. Max Mehl catalogs, and Ovaltine promotional coins. He recounts his relationships with many of the most important figures in numismatic history, including R.S. Yeoman, Eric P. Newman, Q. David Bowers, Walter Breen, William Sheldon, John Ford, and B. Max Mehl. Bressett explains how his corrections to Yeoman's Red Book eventually led to a professional partnership, discusses his passion for ancient Greek silver coins, and shares remarkable anecdotes about the development of the hobby, including his role in popularizing the term "doubled die" for the famous 1955 Lincoln cent variety. The interview also highlights Bressett's contributions as an author, editor, ANA Hall of Fame member, Assay Commissioner, educator, photographer, and researcher whose influence shaped generations of collectors.

The conversation illuminates the culture of twentieth-century numismatics. Bressett describes diving with Mel Fisher at the Atocha treasure site, dining with Eric Newman using silverware made by Paul Revere and Ephraim Brasher, and watching Walter Breen perform on the piano at the 1948 ANA convention. He also shares lesser-known stories about Penn Jillette's numismatic family background, John Ford's abrasive personality and counterfeit operations, and his own mistaken obituary published by the Royal Numismatic Society after he allowed his membership to lapse. Bressett emphasizes lifelong curiosity, scholarship, ethical conduct, and friendship within the hobby, presenting a portrait not only of his own career but also of the personalities and institutions that defined modern American numismatics.

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KRESS AUCTION SALE CATALOGS ON NEWMAN PORTAL

Kress Auction Sale Catalogs on Newman Portal

In viewing the scanning queue at the American Numismatic Society, a recently digitized run of Karl Kress auction sale catalogs caught my eye. Kress, based in Salzburg, was the successor to Otto Helbing (sale nos. 1-88), and numbering in the Kress series begins with no. 89 in 1944. (As an aside, I've always been curious how numismatic sales managed to continue in a war-torn continent – another subject for another day.)

Ted Buttrey's Numismatic Auction Catalogues and Fixed Price Lists details over 55,000 auction sale catalogs and fixed price lists in the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge University and is the first place to look for related bibliographic information. Buttrey notes sales no. 89 – 191, from 1944 to 1986, and nos. 89-157 are now available. John Spring's Ancient Coin Auction Catalogues identifies four of these sales (nos. 106, 110, 112, and 116) as significant for ancient numismatics. Many thanks to Lara Jacobs, who performs scanning and metadata processing at American Numismatic Society, under sponsorship of Newman Numismatic Portal.

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VIDEO: JOHN HIGHFILL, PART 3 OF 3

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NOTES FROM E-SYLUM READERS: MAY 31, 2026

The 1936 Quezon-Roosevelt Peso
Doug Andrews writes:

To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
WASHINGTON, COOLIDGE, TRUMP, LAW AND TRADITION (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n45a24.html)
TRUMP GOLD COIN DELAYED (https://www.coinbooks.org/v29/esylum_v29n21a24.html)

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AMERICA 250 AT THE HIGGINS MUSEUM

The Higgins Museum of National Bank Notes has mounted a special display of 31 currency issues of the Revolutionary War era.

This special exhibition is on loan from the collection of a museum board member and includes issues of the American Colonies when under British rule, early Statehood days as well as notes authorized by the Continental Congress.

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VOCABULARY TERM: SPACE METAL

Space Metal. A new metal alloy formulated in space, outside the gravity restrictions of the earth. While we can only speculate on the physical characteristics of space metals now in the 21st century, it is inevitable that new alloys will be formed in space shortly. Gold, as heavy as it is, cannot be alloyed with light-weight aluminum on earth. And despite the term nickel-silver (actually a bronze alloy) nickel and silver are not a compatible alloy – they cannot be alloyed on earth. (Such mixtures are called noncompatible alloys.) Another is lead and zinc. Could these alloys be formulated in space, and if so, what metallurgical characteristics would these and other new alloys posses? It is obvious a medal could be fabricated in any of these alloys no matter what physical properties they posses. (In the article on medallic object the author predicts that the organization that produces the first medal of space metal will reap a fortune.) But metallurgists might find uses for a space alloy what could be beyond our expectations. Say, a new coinage alloy from space perhaps.

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THE CLEMENS FAMILY

To appreciate the coin collection of James Biddle Clemens, it may help to learn a little about his family, beginning with a wealthy grandfather.

John Mullanphy was born in Northern Ireland in 1758. He joined the Irish Brigade in the French Army at age twenty. He returned to Ireland in 1789 and married a woman half his age, sixteen- year-old Elizabeth Browne (1770-1843). He moved to Philadelphia with his wife and child in 1792, perhaps in search of a half disme. He was successful as a merchant. He moved west to Frankfort, Kentucky, in 1799 and built a house of brick. He returned to Philadelphia and Baltimore to acquire inventory for his store.

He saw St. Louis as a place with good prospects and moved there in 1804, shortly after the Louisiana Purchase. At the time it was a town of about a thousand people, mostly French Canadians. There he served as a justice of the peace. He was a cotton merchant before the war and was in New Orleans in 1815 when general Andrew Jackson seized his cotton bales to build breastworks for defense. At the end of the war, Mullanphy made a great profit selling cotton when the market reopened.

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TREASURE TALK WITH BOB EVANS, EPISODE 14.1

When we did find the S.S. Central America shipwreck, we were met with a previously hidden community and their world. A hundred years before us, the instruments used during the voyages of the Blake had penetrated deep below the waves and discovered the lay of the land, and the general form of some of the animals living there. But no living thing dredged up from the great depths arrived alive at the surface, probably succumbing more to the temperature difference than the pressure.

Renowned American biologist Alexander Agassiz, of Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology served as the principal scientist for those expeditions. In his comprehensive two-volume report (1888), he laments, "We can scarcely hope ever to watch the habits of the deep-sea dwellers, and see them in their natural attitudes, and we must be satisfied to imagine what these are by analogy with their shallow-water allies."

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KEN BRESSETT INTERVIEW, PART ONE

This is Greg Bennick with the Newman Numismatic Portal. I have the honor today of interviewing Ken Bressett. Ken is a numismatic author, researcher, hero, legend, and incredibly nice person. It is an honor to have this opportunity to interview Ken and help to share more of his history and experiences with the numismatic community.

KEN BRESSETT: I'm here. I'm ready to roll.

GREG BENNICK: Let's just start with how you got into coins. Where did it all begin for Ken back in the day?

KEN BRESSETT: I think it began around 1934. I don't know why, but I just took a liking to collecting old coins. Now at that time, youngsters, we collected everything from bugs to matchsticks, anything that we could collect and trade with each other and just have fun. I was like that, but I just happened to like coins. And, I remember getting—I don't know where I found it—one of those catalogs from B. Max Mehl. I was just fascinated because that had so much information in it about coins. I started to do most of my trading with others for Indian cents and things like that. They were very popular back then. I could find Indian cents in change or ask people if they had any because I was collecting them, or thinking I was. (laughs) I was a kid, but I thought I was a good collector. And that's sort of how I got started.

In 1936, the Ovaltine company, which was a food supplement, was sponsoring Little Orphan Annie, and they were running a promotion. In 1936, if you sent in box tops from these cans of Ovaltine, you could get a foreign coin. I think there were maybe eight different countries. I made sure I got all of them. And I still have them. And that's sort of how I began collecting.

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HERITAGE: INDIA SHOWCASE AUCTION

INDO-GREEK KINGDOMS. Bactria. Menander I Soter (ca. 165/155-130 BC). AR Indic drachm (16mm, 2.49 gm, 11h). NGC MS 5/5 - 3/5. Indian standard. Uncertain mint in the Paropamisadai or Gandhara. BASI?EOS SOTHPOS / MENAN?POY, diademed, draped bust of Menander right, seen from front, wearing broad-brimmed, crested Boeotian helmet with bull horn and ear / Maharajasa tratasara Menamdrasa (Kharosthi), Athena advancing left, seen from behind, aegis shield on left arm, brandishing thunderbolt with right; PKA monogram in lower right field. Bopearachchi 16C. HGC 12, 193.

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STACK'S BOWERS: THE L. E. BRUUN COLLECTION

DENMARK. Speciedaler, 1609. Copenhagen Mint. Christian IV. NGC EF Details--Cleaned. Dav-3513; KM-43; Hede-53A; Sieg-102.1; Schou-4; Bruun-4810. Weight: 28.34 gms. Beautiful example of this two-year type displaying a mighty portrait of the king. Some iridescent toning in the obverse legend.

The reverse displays the shields of all Danish territories under the crown, symbolizing the unity of the kingdom. From 1624, the crown evolved to a closed shape, further emphasizing the idea of unity under God. Estimate: €1,800 - €2,500.

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WAYNE'S NUMISMATIC DIARY: MAY 31, 2026

Wednesday morning I woke up early (happenstance, not choice) and decided to get ready for the day, grabbing my backpack and suitcase for a trip to Pittsburgh for the Pennsylvania Association of Numismatists (PAN) show. It was a miserable rainy drive with a traffic jam and detour off the highway. But things got better later in the morning, with the sun peeking through and Spotify deciding to play Johnny Nash's "I Can See Clearly Now [the rain is gone...]"

Arriving in time for lunch I tried for the first time the Caliente Pizza & Draft House down the road from the convention hotel, the Hampton Inn in Monroeville. It's a friendly neighborhood local chain and my baked Italian sub was wonderful. I checked in to my hotel, worked on The E-Sylum a bit, then took a nap before heading out again to meet my sister for dinner and a movie - "The Devil Wears Prada 2". We enjoyed it and I'd recommend it to readers. So not much numismatics on Day One.

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TINNAHS: THE CHIEF'S COPPER

Daily Alaska Empire, Juneau, September 19, 1941.

COPPER "CURRENCY" OF ALASKA NATIVES IS MUSEUM EXHIBIT

Proof that Alaska Indians, before the advent of the white men, operated their finances strictly on a copper standard is shown in a new exhibit which made its appearance at the Territorial Museum this week.

Called a Tinneh, or Chief's Copper, it is a huge copper shield with hand-hammered decorations, once used for money among the Thlinget and other Southeast Alaska Tribes.

Loaned to the museum from the private collection of Edward L. Keithahn, curator, the piece is said to increased in value each time it changed hands. Some of these copper plates, Keithahn declares, were once traded for thousands of blankets.

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REVOLUTIONARY WAR FRENCH ENCAMPMENT FOUND

Relic hunters scouring a farm field south of Fredericksburg, Virginia, were turning up the usual Civil War artifacts when their metal detectors hit something strange. Eleven little buttons emerged from the ground near a creek, with odd mounts on the back and delicate numbers on the front.

Lafayette "Scotty" Crabtree Jr. and Greg Lagasse ran an online image search, and the results were unlike anything they had encountered in a lifetime of hunting for treasure in Virginia.

The buttons were 244 years old, and French.

"What? French?" Crabtree, 71, said through a haze of Pall Mall cigarette smoke, recalling the moment from more than a year ago. Near the buttons, they also discovered Spanish and English coins from the early 1700s.

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THE CARD MONEY OF FRENCH CANADA

In the 17th century, New France was trying to find its footing in the Americas. The French had been active in North America as early as 1534, when Jacques Cartier first explored the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. Over the next two centuries, the extent of French possessions in North America grew until it achieved its largest territorial reach in 1712. While its territories extended as far as modern day Louisiana, its most important colony was Canada, which extended south of the Great Lakes to the Gulf of St. Lawrence. With its capital at Quebec City, the legacy of the French in Canada endures to this day, including in the United States, where French town names can be found across the East and Midwest. Its numismatic importance, however, is seen in the rare surviving pieces of card money that were issued in the colony.

Card money was the brainchild of Jacques de Meulles, the chief administrator of the colony from 1682 to 1686, who was chronically short of small change. Because New France had to import much of what it used from the mother country, specie naturally flowed back to France, and coin shortages were common. De Meulles' most urgent concern was payments to soldiers, which could not be delayed. To remedy the problem, he decided to cut up packs of playing cards, sign them, and issue them as money. The cards were readily accepted by local merchants, and over time, the use of card money grew. Specific quantities were issued, and they were redeemed after a pre-determined period.

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TRUMP $250 BANKNOTE PUSHED AT BEP

Trump administration officials have pressed the office responsible for printing the nation's money to design a $250 bill featuring the president's portrait, according to four current and former employees, in what would be the first appearance of a living person on U.S. currency in more than 150 years.

Starting last year, two political appointees at the Treasury Department — U.S. Treasurer Brandon Beach and his senior adviser, Mike Brown — repeatedly urged staff at the agency's Bureau of Engraving and Printing to prepare prototypes of the note, according to the employees, who said the move raised concerns because federal law currently allows only deceased people to appear on bills.

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RAID SEIZES CIA OFFICIAL'S GOLD BAR STASH

A former CIA senior officer with top secret-level clearance has been accused of secretly stashing millions of dollars in gold bars in his home that he said he needed for "work-related expenses," according to court documents and two people familiar with his employment history.

David Rush, who held a management position, was charged with criminal theft of public money in a complaint filed last week in the Eastern District of Virginia. His lawyer didn't respond to a request for comment.

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LOOSE CHANGE: MAY 31, 2026

The Hedge That Hid 3,000 Ancient Silver Coins

One of the most remarkable, and least widely known, Anglo-Saxon treasure discoveries in Sussex began with a group of farm labourers clearing a hedge on Chancton Farm in 1866.

As they worked, the men uncovered an old earthenware pot and, upon breaking it open, discovered 3,000 silver coins.

Initially accepted as payment at a local pub, the coins were later transferred to the British Museum after being declared treasure trove.

The hoard consisted of Anglo-Saxon silver pennies from the reigns of Edward the Confessor and Harold II, with none minted after the Battle of Hastings in 1066.

To read the complete article, see:
The hedge that hid 3,000 ancient silver coins (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c9we07g1w75o)

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ABOUT THIS ISSUE: MAY 31, 2026

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