ABOUT THIS ISSUE: JANUARY 4, 2026

Happy New Year, everyone. We had a nice midnight gathering with some neighbors, and I spent the afternoon of New Year's Day putting away our outdoor Christmas lights. It was cold, but I got it done with some help from our middle son to get some of the light strands off the tree in our front yard.

On Monday and Tuesday I'd gone up to Pittsburgh for a nice lunch with Pat McBride of PAN and his wife Dawn, and an equally nice dinner with my sister. Dinner was at an old tavern in the neighborhood where we'd grown up. I'd arrived early and ordered an appetizer and diet Pepsi, telling the waiter, "this is me 57 years ago" - the bar was where my father would order me a Pepsi while he and his buddies had beers on a Saturday afternoon. His buddies taught me to shoot pool in the back room. Under new management and a new name, the place is quite popular these days. If you're ever in Pittsburgh for a coin show (such as PAN or the August 2026 ANA World's Fair of Money) and want to try some local color at a friendly neighborhood bar with great food, take an Uber to the Bulldog Pub in Morningside.

On Friday I completed my digital upgrade, adding a new phone to go with my new laptop computer. If you can't remember how long it's been since you upgraded, it's probably time to upgrade. My phone was running out of space and the laptop had only one working shift key - those were additional clues.

With some spare time on my hands this week, I came across many interesting non-numismatic articles, in one of which I learned the word "frigidarium" and in another that "the Romans observed an extra month called Mercedonius every two or three years." Who knew? Not me.
Americans in 1998 tried to predict 2025. Here's what they got right (https://www.cnn.com/2025/12/29/politics/americans-predictions-1998-2025)
Can You ‘Live Long And Prosper' By Learning Economics From Star Trek? Or Is That ‘Highly Illogical'? (https://studyfinds.org/can-you-live-long-and-prosper-by-learning-economics-from-star-trek-highly-illogical/)
Classical statues were not painted horribly (https://www.worksinprogress.news/p/classical-statues-were-not-painted)
How the internet changed news, according to The Onion (https://bigthinkmedia.substack.com/p/how-the-internet-changed-news-according)
AI is making reading books feel obsolete – and students have a lot to lose (https://theconversation.com/ai-is-making-reading-books-feel-obsolete-and-students-have-a-lot-to-lose-262680)
How the Calendar Got So Complicated (https://historyfacts.com/world-history/article/how-the-calendar-got-so-complicated/)
He exposed the myth of the South's ‘Lost Cause.' His death shook Richmond. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2026/01/02/richmond-valentine-museum-martin-confederate/)
ARPANET (https://www.britannica.com/topic/ARPANET/A-packet-of-data)
Why don't archivists digitize everything? (https://peelarchivesblog.com/2017/05/31/why-dont-archivists-digitize-everything/)
Warren Buffett's blind spot: Did the digital economy leave him behind? (https://fortune.com/2025/12/30/warren-buffett-blind-spot-tech-investing-apple/)
6 Famous Foods Invented by Accident (https://interestingfacts.com/famous-foods-invented-by-accident/)

-Editor

Wayne Homren
Wayne Homren is the founding editor of The E-Sylum and a consultant for the Newman Numismatic Portal. His collecting interests at various times included U.S. Encased Postage Stamps, merchant counterstamps, Pittsburgh Obsolete paper money, Civil War tokens and scrip, Carnegie Hero Medals, charge coins and numismatic literature. He also collects and has given presentations on the work of Money Artist J.S.G. Boggs. In the non-numismatic world he's worked in artificial intelligence, data science, and as a Program Manager for the U.S. Department of Defense.

Garrett Ziss
Garrett Ziss is a numismatic collector and researcher, with a focus on American paper money and early U.S. silver and copper coins. He is also a part-time U.S. coin cataloger for Heritage Auctions. Garrett assists Editor Wayne Homren by editing and formatting a selection of articles and images each week. When he's not engaged in numismatics, Garrett is pursuing a Master's Degree in Quantitative Economics at the University of Pittsburgh.

Pete Smith
Numismatic researcher and author Pete Smith of Minnesota has written about early American coppers, Vermont coinage, numismatic literature, tokens and medals, the history of the U.S. Mint and much more. Author of American Numismatic Biographies, he contributes original articles to The E-Sylum often highlighting interesting figures in American numismatic history.

Greg Bennick
Greg Bennick (www.gregbennick.com) is a keynote speaker and long time coin collector with a focus on major mint error coins and US counterstamps. He is on the board of both CONECA and TAMS and enjoys having in-depth conversations with prominent numismatists from all areas of the hobby. Have ideas for other interviewees? Contact him anytime on the web or via instagram @minterrors.

John Nebel
Numismatist, photographer, and ANS Board member and Fellow John Nebel of Boulder, CO helped the ANA and other clubs like NBS get online in the early days of the internet, hosting websites gratis through his Computer Systems Design Co. To this day he hosts some 50 ANA member club sites along with our coinbooks.org site, making the club and our E-Sylum archive available to collectors and researchers worldwide.

Bruce Perdue
Encased coinage collector (encasedcoins.info) Bruce Perdue of Aurora, Illinois has been the volunteer NBS webmaster from its early days and works each week to add the latest E-Sylum issue to our archive and send out the email announcement.