Thanks to everyone who reached out with contact information for Duane Feisel. We got in touch, and he's doing well, still lifting logs in his 90s. -Editor

Last week, Len Augsburger asked about a group of metal rods fell out of the spine of a copy of Ancient Art in Bowdoin College by Kevin Herbert. -Editor

"My theory is that the six "Mystery Metal Rods Found in Book on Ancient Art" are a show & tell example of what the ancient Greeks defined as a fistful of six metal sticks (called obols) that people held together in one hand for trading, commonly referred to in the day as a drachma.

"I was able to purchase a silver obol of the Kingdom of Bactria, Eucratides I (c170-145 BC) at the ANA WFM Pittsburgh from Mid-American Rare Coin Galleries for our Bozeman Coin Club Coins in the Classroom program. This will be a fine piece of show & tell."

"While there are other possibilities, I believe that the metal rods found in the Ancient Art in Bowdoin College book were likely put there by a professional binder who added reinforcement materials to strengthen a failing spine. They typically use spine boards or other non-metallic stiffeners but for heavy, oversized or just heavily-used important texts they might resort to metal rods."

"Rods were inserted in the spines of books while bookbinding. See https://henryhebert.net/2011/12/."

Well, the consensus seems to be on the bookbinding artifact theory. Thanks, everyone! -Editor

In a discussion with Alan Luedeking about book image quality, he offered this great tip for authors drafting manuscripts in MS-Word: "Make sure under Options\Advanced that you have these settings selected." -Editor

Great tip - thanks! -Editor

"The gold slug coin design spoon from last week's E-Sylum is reasonably well-known, and also fairly valuable. There are a couple that have been on eBay for a long time, without buyers at $2500+ (https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=california+slug+spoon), so it's apparently worth "less than that". There's still a lot of room less than that.

"Stack's has sold almost two dozen examples of several different designs at prices from just under $1,000 to over $2,500 (https://archive.stacksbowers.com/?q=89d9449a-3137-452a-8b37-dfa2b7827fca).

"They suggest these spoons were produced for the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition in 1915. That seems unlikely, given that this example is engraved July 1st 1898."

"This was made by Albrecht Kuner, the famous gold rush engraver in San Francisco. See the signature at the bottom. No connection to Nebraska that I am aware of. Kuner died in 1906 but not in the earthquake and fire. All his records were destroyed however.

"The spoons are not particularly rare but trade regularly at about $1000+. There are different handle varieties. But the attached slug facsimile from the same dies is very rare. I have only seen one. I should have bought it when I had the chance..."

Thanks, everyone! -Editor