ABOUT THIS ISSUE: SEPTEMBER 13, 2026

I got moving early Monday morning and ran the equivalent of a 5K around our neighborhood. I'll keep training, but should be in good shape for the race on September 26th. I spent part of the morning on a task for the Newman Numismatic Portal, photographing and packing some literature and ephemera to send off for scanning. Tuesday morning I had my first full exercise session with my new trainer, and later that morning I was on an NNP Zoom call with Len Augsburger.

While continuing to clear off my desk this week, I took some time to read the December 2025 issue of The Journal of Early American Numismatics, particularly the articles by Julia Casey and Chris McDowell on the Fugio Copper and the Stepney Hoard, respectively. The latter has an extensive genealogical study on numismatist Walter H. Breen, clearing up a number of inconsistencies, omissions and fabrications in Breen's own stories of his upbringing. Quite interesting and revealing.

I also read Bob Van Ryzin's Numismatic News article about a fanciful connection between Shakespeare and early American colonial coinage (hint - the play The Tempest is based on the voyage of a ship connected with the Sommer Islands (Bermuda) and "Hogge Money."

On Saturday my lunch tab ended in .76, and I happened to have 76 cents in coins on me. I paid with those and a larger bill. The young man at the counter handed back the correct amount in paper bills and thanked me for paying with change. "It's a lot easier to count out the paper money." So maybe there's hope for the younger generation after all.

Finally, here are some interesting non-numismatic items I came across this week.

Purdue grad who flew would-be suicide mission on Sept. 11, 2001, shares story (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EObvbEcwE-0)

He's Seen Images of 9/11 From Just About Every Angle. Except This One. (https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/09/nyregion/911-disposable-camera.html)

A Roman emperor died from eating too much cheese. (https://historyfacts.com/world-history/fact/roman-emperor-died-from-eating-cheese/)

7 Things You Forgot Happened During the Revolutionary War (https://historyfacts.com/us-history/article/revolutionary-war/)

6 Popular Foods That Came From the Military (https://historyfacts.com/world-history/article/foods-that-came-from-the-military/)

How to be a word detective (https://psyche.co/guides/how-to-be-a-word-detective)

The Dominican Baseball Factory (https://www.propublica.org/article/how-dominican-republic-baseball-factory-traps-players-mlb-santo-caraballo)

Scientists Are Making Concrete With Human Poop – And It Gets 42% Stronger (https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-are-making-concrete-with-human-poop-and-it-gets-42-stronger)

-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 via instagram @minterrors. He can also be reached by email at minterrors@gmail.com.

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.