OHIO WELCOMES ANS RELOCATION

 
ANS New York Headquarters in 1909

In 1858, the American Numismatic Society was founded by a 16-year-old coin enthusiast in his family apartment in Manhattan. It has since transformed from one hobbyist's passion project into an extensive collection of coins and medals, and now attracts scholars from all over the world.

But the rising cost of living and real estate in New York eventually became an unsustainable burden for the group.

Seeking a new home that better suited their financial and spatial needs, the ANS executive director, Ute Wartenberg Kagan, began looking beyond the island of Manhattan. Ultimately, the solution didn't come from a boardroom or a broker — it came from a fifteen-minute phone call with an old friend.

Now, after 168 years in New York, the ANS and its historic collection are moving their headquarters to Toledo.

In 2009, Adam Levine — a graduate student in art history — completed a summer seminar at the ANS. While there, he forged a lasting friendship with Ute Wartenberg Kagan, the society's president.

Years later, Levine heard about the ANS's struggle to find a suitable new home.

The society had been in various New York locations since its founding. But the city's rent prices continue to rise, and with low attendance and a $1.8 million annual lease set to expire in 2028, the society knew they needed a change. They considered partnerships with UPenn and UChicago, as well as a potential move to the Armory in Fall River, Massachusetts.

As a native New Yorker, Levine intimately understood the real estate difficulties the ANS faced. As the director and CEO of the Toledo Museum of Art, he knew of a recently vacant space on the TMA campus.

It only took Levine 15 minutes on the phone to convince Wartenberg Kagan that she should fly out and give Toledo a look. After touring the campus and meeting with the TMA staff, as well as Toledo mayor Wade Kapszukiewicz, she was sold.

"I fell in love with Toledo," she said. "I thought, ‘Wow, that's a great place.'"

The new headquarters will be located in the Professional Arts Building, a four-story Art Deco building on the TMA campus. Toledoans might recognize it as the former home of the Toledo Alliance for the Performing Arts and the Arts Commission of Greater Toledo.

The building was purchased as part of a $20 million plan to expand the society's educational and research capabilities and to display coins that would otherwise remain in storage. At the new headquarters, Wartenberg Kagan envisions a small, dedicated gallery that would see their coin collection interspersed with other works of art on loan from TMA and other museums nearby.

Compared to significant European numismatic collections, which often grew out of royal collections over centuries, the ANS's collection is young, with the majority of its current holdings accumulated in the 20th century. Many of these coins have yet to be studied and catalogued.

To read the complete article, see:
Cha-ching: Ohio lands America's most prestigious coin collection (https://www.statenews.org/section/the-ohio-newsroom/2026-02-04/cha-ching-ohio-lands-americas-most-prestigious-coin-collection)

To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
ANS ANNOUNCES MOVE TO TOLEDO, OHIO (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n47a05.html)
NEW YORK TIMES COVERS ANS MOVE (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n47a06.html)
TOLEDO COVERAGE OF THE ANS MOVE (https://www.coinbooks.org/v28/esylum_v28n47a07.html)

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