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Minutes of the 1038th Meeting

The 1038th meeting of the Chicago Coin Club was called to order at 7 PM by President Robert Feiler with 13 members and 1 guest present. The guest was John Adams a free-lance photojournalist representing Leo Burnett Company and Chicago Creative Club who are compiling a directory of Chicago clubs.

The May Minutes were approved as published in the Chatter. Steve Zitowsky, Treasurer, reported May revenue of $121.57, expenses of $167.90, leaving a total asset balance of $7,651.53. Zitowsky reported receiving a letter with Kermit Wasmer’s resignation.

The featured speaker for the evening was Robert Weinstein on the subject of “Small Change: Epidemic Counterfeiting in 4th Century Roman Britain.” With the help of the document reader, Weinstein was able to show various genuine coins and their counterfeits from the reigns of Constantine the Great (307-337 AD) and his successor Constantius II (337-361). He also brought four reference books for those who wished to learn more about the subject.

Exhibitors for the evening were: JOHN RILEY – various international type coin albums made by Whitman during the 1960s and 2 dies used to strike military tokens; WINSTON ZACK – a 1763 Hungarian bronze coin showing Maria Theresa (obv.) and Madonna with child (rev.), and a copy of Harzfeld’s 15th Sale of Coins & Medals auction catalog issued in 1880 by Bangs & Co. of NY; MARK WIECLAW – a denarius of Pescennius Niger (193-199 AD), a double-struck Kennedy half-dollar, a Mexican 50-peso-sized gold commemorative, and head-and-tails tokens; ROBERT WEINSTEIN - 4 Indo-Parthian coins included a silver drachm of Gondophares the Great, Gondophares-Sases, Sanabares and a bronze tetradrachm of Gondophares-Sases; ROBERT FEILER - 1892-3 Columbian Exposition box medal, a 1981 British dead man’s Penny with a diameter 4.75” medal struck for those who lost a family member when the Lusitania sank, 1878 patented specie pocket case, and a French Napoleon Pewter box medal; and DON DOOL – 3 different handbill/store cards from S. American countries, an 1839 leper colony token from Venezuela, a 1978 medal commemorating the bicentennial of San Martín’s birth and a reproduction of a rare San Martín medal.

Under business Mark Wieclaw reported the availability of Reza’s Restaurant, 432 W. Ontario for the Club’s December banquet. William Burd announced the purchase of a video projector that works with MS PowerPoint presentations and offered to bring it to Club meetings if the projector from BankOne is unavailable. Carl Wolf distributed auction catalogs to everyone in attendance of the Herb & Martha Schingoethe Obsolete Currency Collection Part 3 (June 17-18 Memphis, TN) compliments of R.M. Smythe. William Burd received a round of applause after the announcement that he was appointed to the Board of the Illinois Numismatic Association. It was announced that Don Dool would be the speaker at the July meeting on the subject of German States' Coins from the Kipper Era (1617-1623).

The meeting was recessed at 8:35 PM and will be called to order 1 PM, June 25th at the MidAmerica Coin Expo in Rosemont.

Session II of the 1039th meeting was called to order at 1 PM by President Robert Feiler with 11 members and 8 guest present. In addition to the featured speaker, David Sundman, guests included: David Marshall, Richard & Rita Hall, Sherri Zack, Charles Wilkinson, Rita Jene Sledz and Todd Haefer from Krause Publications.

David Sundman’s presentation was titled 19th Century Stereo Photographs of the U.S. Mint and was received well by the membership. Everyone was provided with special glasses to view the 3-D stereo photo images.

After answering a series of questions, David was presented with an Educational Certificate from the American Numismatic Association and an engraved Club medal. The meeting was adjourned at 2 PM.

Respectfully submitted, Carl Wolf
Secretary

Speaker's Wor[l]d
Small Change: Epidemic Counterfeiting in 4th Century Roman Britain

Presented by Robert Weinstein to our June 8, 2005 meeting.

The counterfeiting of non-precious metal coinage sometimes indicated a shortage of non-precious circulating coinage. The common person's interests were on a small scale, while governments were interested in the big things, interested in silver and gold.

An early numismatic theory held that these counterfeits were produced after Rome left Britain; today, Phillip V. Hill's report is great for the illustrations but not good for its ideas. A better reference is #65 in the ANS' Numismatic Notes and Monographs series, by C.H.V. Sutherland in 1935.

There were epidemics of counterfeiting throughout the Roman Empire. Britain, on the empire's edge, experienced a number of epidemics; the first, coming soon after the conquest, was an initation of Claudius' bronze.

Bob first showed a coin of Constantine honoring the military, with two soldiers standing by two standards on the reverse. The coin weighs 3 grams and is 18 mm in diameter. The next coin was a 12 mm imitation weighing only 1 gram; the die was much larger than the blank, so much of the design is off of the blank. Although similar counterfeits are common, this piece is nicer than most and was acquired from the detectorist who had found it.

Counterfeit of a 2 Solidus Type, 12 mm diameter.

More examples of original coins and their counterfeits followed. Although the empire saw a huge commemorative coinage honoring the founding of Constantinople, not much of it originated in Britain. But the counterfeits of that coinage are found in Britain. Another city commemortaive now found as counterfeit is the Urbs Roma type with a personification of Rome. Counterfeits come in many sizes, even down to only 2 mm in diameter. Of course, attributing pieces with so much of the design lying off-flan can be challenging.

The production method is believed to have been very simple: draw a rod of bronze, slice off blanks, and stamp them; the result often was a thick coin. Boone believed that these coins passed by weight, so uniformity was not important. Remember, too, that the word follis was both a unit of weight and a denomination. At one time, it was thought that the first counterfeits were large, and then were made smaller to increase the profit to the minter. But that is contrary to passing by weight.

There now is little doubt that these counterfeits circulated; they are found in hoards along with official coins. These counterfeits were produced in many places (not official mints). Bob concluded with an observation on the term counterfeit; it is used by experts to indicate all non-official strikes, even if fraud was not the intent.

Speaker's Wor[l]d
19th Century 3-D Slides of the U.S. Mint

Presented by David Sundman to our June 25, 2005 meeting.

The program started with images of the Mint buildings in Charlotte, New Orleans, Denver, San Francisco and Carson City. That was folowed by historic scenes from the Yukon Gold Rush in Alaska, gold mines of Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, hydraulic mining, and a fascinating photo of thirty huge bars of silver that made up a sidewalk for use by President Ulysses Grant when he visited the Colorado silver region.

A series of images dealt with the Philadelphia Mint, beginning with the National Numismatic Collection in the lobby, followed by photos of the various areas used to turn metal into coins. We saw the smelting room, assay equipment, rolling gold bars into ribbons, inspecting gold blanks, weighing gold blanks, the first steam coinage press, coinage presses, and gold pieces. And there was a quarter of a million dollars in gold coins on a table.

Another series of images, following a view of the Treasury Building, included the cash room, vault, and bags and bags of silver dollars. Among the buildings in New York were the Sub Treasury holding the nation’s gold, as well as the headquarters of the National Bank Note Company and the American Bank Note Company.

Near the end David showed images of the First National Bank of Philadelphia, Charter No. 1, a bank vault in Chicago Fire rubble with an employee trying to cool it down by pouring water on it a week later, a bank vault in the debris of San Francisco’s earthquake and fire, the destruction room at the Treasury, the committee overseeing the destruction, and various photos of the Chicago’s Columbian Exposition including the Treasury Building with a section dedicated to silver mining interests.

Many companies produced stereogrphic photos during its heyday from the 1850s until 1910; collecting stereographic photos is a small but active hobby. The trick is to find numismatic material, but then David cautioned us that the captions on numismatic stereoviews are accurate only half the time. David concluded with thanks to Ron Labbe for the projection setup he used, and recommended that anyone interested in further details google that name. Someone in the audience suggested searching for stereoviews with the keyword anaglyph as that will avoid hits on all the other on-line uses of "3-D."

Show and Tell

Presented at our June 8, 2005 meeting.

Each image has a scale in the lower-left corner, with the tics spaced 1 mm apart. Because the brightness and contrast were manipulated on a computer, the coloring of a coin's image differs from the coin's actual coloring.

1. John Riley started the program by continuing on a previous topic, Whitman bookshelf coin albums for type collections from various countries. A Great Britain type set album from Queen Victoria's reign, 1837-1901, and John is looking for Maundy pieces to complete it.
   John also collects military base tokens, and he showed the pre-WW II steel dies for units of the 3rd Infantry Division: Battery A, 9th Field Artillery; and Co. K, 4th Infantry. He concluded by passing around some wax planchets he had struck with the dies, and that led to some members' thoughts on unidentified modern restrikes.
2. Winston Zack showed two pieces acquired on eBay:
   • An indistinct copper piece for $4, supposedly a Colonial coin. A close examination shows it to be a 1763 hungarian coin with a Madonna and child reverse.
   • An 1880 Bangs and Company auction catalog, but only after receiving the item did he notice the listing's fine print stating "copy."
3. Mark Wieclaw showed three more of the the adult token series he showed at the previous meeting, then he moved onto his serious exhibits:
   • At first glance it is a Mexican 50 peso gold piece, but it is a same-sized medal commemorating the first centennial of the 1857 Constitution.
   • A double struck 1972-D Kennedy half dollar; no longer round because of a small protruding hemisphere with just the 9 of the date resulting from the second, far off-centered, strike.
   • A denarius from Antioch of Pescennius Niger, who was illed 86 days after becoming emperor; the flan is small, but the bust is good. On the reverse, Spes has a polos on her head, is holding a flower, and is raising her skirt.
4. Robert Weinstein showed Indo-Parthian coins (parts of modern-day Afghanistan and Pakistan).
   • A silver drachm of Gondophares; in this area, only Sakastan made silver coins. On the reverse, the king's flowery titles are in Greek and cycles inard: left to right across the top, down the right side, upside down across the bottom, up the left side, then left to right under the legend start, and so on inward.
   • A silver drachm of Sases, about 20-30 are known to exist.
   • A silver drachm of Sanabares, it is the most ommonly found ilver piece from this era. The obverse legend now is in Pahlavi while the reverse legend is in good Greek.
   • A rare type of bronze Indo-Parthian coin with about 10-20 known. It is one of the first coins showing that later kings were including the name of Gondophares in their name. All of the above kings are known only from their coins.
5. Robert Feiler showed a wide range of items:
   • A Napoleonic medal with a damaged rim.
   • A box medal he had shown a few years ago, but it was repaired earlier that day in the Jewelers Mall Building.
   • An oval specie case, patented in 1878. Spring loaded, it has holes for nickels, dimes, quarters, and halves (it can hold 6 of each).
   • A so called dead man's penny; a large uniface medal bearing, in a tablet, the name of a fatality of the sinking of the Lusitania.
6. Don Dool showed items acquired while he was in Argentina:
   • A few of the handbills that are widely distributed in Argentina; one, for a fur and leather store, used the U.S. $100 bill for one side.
   • A 1939 12½ bolivas leper colony token from Venezuela.
   • A 10 centisimos paper note added to Don's 19th century scripophily collection.
   • A large San Martín medal for the bicentennial of his birth.
   • A restrike of a San Martín medal; the original is unique and is in a museum. This is one of 46 reproductions issued during 1913-1920, and his June World Coin News article, picturing this reproduction, is his first article to be illustrated in color; in a grayscale image, the medal would have been just a blob.

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