I’ve enjoyed reading the reminiscences of Ted Buttrey, a man I never met but with whom I corresponded regularly over the past several years. I don’t have much to add, but will contribute this little incident. Back in August, I asked Ted if I could send him a copy of the Memorias de la Academia Mexicana de Estudios Numismáticos that included his famous article no one here had the guts to publish. I asked if he would sign it and send it back. His response was, “Hell, man, I’m just Mrs. Buttrey’s little boy. But OK.”

He was a neat guy.

I have an idea for a book that I think would be very useful to the collecting community: a guide on Private and Territorial Gold, to include California fractional gold coins. The main references for these items are sometimes hard to find and usually very expensive, sometimes making even the details on these very fascinating coins relatively inaccessible. It seems to me that a decent guide in the Bowers series would be very helpful to foster interest in future generations.

I know as a kid, the private and territorial section of the Red Book was one of my favorite sections and it prompted me to get as many references as I could and try to acquire some of these coins and even though it is pretty much guaranteed that I will never own a $50 slug, I absolutely love reading about them. I think it would extremely beneficial to have the field opened up to a wide audience.

The E C W G on the 2018 Crown represents the four living generations of the British Royal family: Elizabeth II, & her descendants Charles III; William V; and George VII. *If* this is how succession plays out, that's four prime numbers in a row!

Steve Bishop asked about General Motors encased dollars. I have two in the archives, one each of type one and two. My type one hosts a VF 1901-O Morgan and the type two has an AU 1884 plain Morgan, much like the one illustrated by Mr. Bishop.

Although this is not a dollar, I thought it was rather interesting. I have seen the encased Buick dollars but did not realize that there were other denominations as well, until I saw this one on eBay. The auction closed about a week ago. I am not really an encased coin collector and did not bid on it but I do like oddities so I kept it on a watch list. Being a dime and Canadian definitely made it out of the ordinary.

I still have a few sets still available from the previous Olympic games. Please contact me for additional information & pricing.

I noticed the story about the Mint’s mutilated coin program. I wrote about this on my blog in 2015, and thought readers might find it amusing.

There is a large (50 mm) silver-plated medal honoring the Silver Dollar Bar.