Chatter

7 Months until ANA in Chicago

Have you determined what you will exhibit at ANA? Email all exhibiting questions to ANA2011Exhibits@ChicagoCoinClub.org. If you are not able to exhibit, there are speaking opportunities in the Numismatic Theatre. Email all speaking questions to ANA2011Theatre@ChicagoCoinClub.org.

The December Chatter contained some errors in the minutes of the Third Meeting of the ANA 2011 Convention Host Committee: the convention theme will be Chicago: My Kind of Coin Town (not ANA 120, 1891-2011), and the WCE items are held at the Field Museum (not Art Institute). These errors have been corrected in the online version of the December Chatter.

Minutes of the 1104th Meeting

The 1104th meeting of the Chicago Coin Club was held December 18, 2010 at Marcello’s Restaurant, 645 W. North Avenue. President Jeffrey Rosinia called the meeting to order at 7 PM with 24 members and 10 guests: Wendy Bierly, Brad Biegel, Cynthia Johnson, Marcia Zitowsky, Debbie Green, Kathy Rosinia, Sally Wieclaw, Janet Leonard, Mary Claire Jakes and Robert Hamilton.

As this was the Annual Banquet, a motion was passed to adopt an abbreviated agenda. President Rosinia recited a list of 2010 club accomplishments, then acknowledged and asked for a warm round of applause for Mark Wieclaw and William Burd (appetizers), Sharon and Kevin Blocker (speaker’s dinner), Steve Zitowsky (Banquet Chairman & room deposit) and Carl Wolf (raffle prizes).

First V.P. Lyle Daly introduced the evening’s speaker John Riley who delivered a program on Manila Bay’s Sunken Treasure, a story about thousands of silver pesos dumped in Manila Bay just prior to the invasion by Japanese troops and still unrecovered. Following a question and answer period, Lyle presented Riley with an engraved club medal and an ANA Educational Certificate.

A motion was passed to accept the slate of officers for the 2011-12 as put forth by the Nomination Committee. Past President Robert Leonard performed the swearing in of: Jeffrey Rosinia, President; Lyle Daly, First V.P.; Elliott Krieter, Second V.P.; Directors: Eugene Freeman (not present), Marc Stackler (not present) & Carl Wolf; and Immediate Past President Robert Feiler.

Second V.P. Elliott Krieter spoke of the numismatic education shared at monthly meetings and presented engraved medals to recipients of the 2010 Annual Cabeen Exhibit Awards: First Place: Robert Weinstein (not present); Second Place: Mark Wieclaw; and Honorable Mention: Carl Wolf, Marc Stackler (not present), Rich Lipman, Robert Leonard, Eugene Freeman (not present) and Robert Feiler.

Following the second reading of Quentin Burrows application for membership, a motion was passed to accept him into membership. It was announced that Leroy Gayden’s Army Reserve Unit was activated and he would be unable to attend a meeting through 2011. A motion was passed to consider Leroy’s club dues paid until his return. President Rosinia called for a moment of silence honoring the passing of long-time member Michael Dolnick. Robert Leonard, General Chairman of the 2011 ANA Convention, spoke on the next planning committee meeting January 19, 2011 in Rosemont.

Carl Wolf announced $173 in raffle ticket sales for the Club treasury, and then conducted the drawing of 26 blind-wrapped business-to-business gifts donated by his marketing firm.

The meeting was adjourned at 9:15 PM. Among the photographs taken was Leroy Gayden surrounded by six members who served in the U.S. armed forces. They were John Riley (Navy), Robert Feiler (Army Reserves), Kurt Hyde (Air Force), Steve Zitowsky (Army), Richard Hamilton (Air Force) and Elliott Krieter (Air Force).

Respectfully Submitted,
Carl Wolf, Secretary

Speaker’s Wor[l]d
U.S./Philippines Sea Salvage:
WWII Sunken Treasure or Damaged Goods?

by John Riley
presented to our December 18, 2010 meeting

We are able to reasonably place a select group of coins at the scene of one of the most significant struggles of the Second World War — at a time when the fates of nations were very much in question.

The blow that crippled U.S. naval and air forces in the Hawaiian Islands on December 7, 1941 occurred again within hours at the major military and port installations in the Philippines. Without naval support from Hawaii or the mainland United States, her defenders literally found themselves trapped. Lingayan Gulf on Luzon, northernmost and heaviest populated island in the territory, was invaded in force by main elements of the Japanese 14th Army on December 22 and the capital at Manila fell within two weeks. Prior to the actual fall of the capital on January 2, 1942, government securities consisting of some 73 tons in gold and silver bullion, 140 tons of silver peso and centavo coins plus millions of paper Treasury notes, bonds and corporate stocks were taken from the Philippine National Treasury buildings and the safe rooms of the Philippine Central Bank to Corregidor Island in Manila Bay by U.S. Army work details. Through April, 1942 U.S. submarines were able to enter Manila Bay and surface at Corregidor during the hours of darkness to evacuate key government, military and civilian officials from the island; with those same submarines travelled out the bullion and securities and what coinage they could for safekeeping, eventually at the United States Mint in San Francisco. The paper money was recorded and burned on Corregidor, but the problem remained of what to do with the remaining 15,700,000 ($7.85 million U.S.) in silver coins.

With capture now certain, there were no other options left to secure the remaining 115 tons in silver coin: on April 20, the decision was approved by the command staff for U.S. Army Lieutenant General Jonathon Wainwright to dump the boxed coins into Manila Bay itself. Two straight lines connecting known landmarks intersected at the rough, deep water point of Caballo Bay proximate to the barrio of San Jose; it was there for ten nights in late March and early April, 1942 that nearly three thousand boxes, each containing approximately 6000 peso coins were unceremoniously dumped by scattered work crews including many U.S. Navy sailors from the destroyed submarine tender USS Canopus and rescue ship USS Pigeon.

American and Filipino forces on Corregidor Island were finally forced to capitulate to Japanese General Masaharu Homma, commanding the invasion forces, on May 6, 1942.

The submerged silver didn’t remain a secret for long. Within weeks, many of the same USS Canopus and Pigeon divers who had deposited the coins were now being ordered as Prisoners of War to withdraw them. The depth at which the boxes were dropped and the speciality deep water diving equipment required were beyond the area capabilities of the Japanese. Only about $2.5 million was officially raised by the diver POWs in the course of the next few months, but through clever subterfuge, a significant lesser amount was denied their captors and was smuggled out into the local economy. Storms, strong currents, quick natural wood rot plus damages intentionally inflicted on the boxes by the divers further scattered the pesos in the Bay and the Japanese soon abandoned attempts to raise more of the coins.

Large scale commercial salvaging operations after the War, notably conducted for the Bureau of the Treasury from 1945-48 and still later by the Central Bank of the Philippines through the late 1950s, raised some 10,300,000 pesos. With all recovery difficulties considered, final estimates place the unaccounted coins at approximately 2.5 million pesos.

The theory has never been proposed that the Japanese military commemorative medals produced by Zamora were, in fact, sea salvage! I think it is worth considering. How did General Homma commandeer a whole bag of small-sized Pesos in 1942? Could they have come from the earliest recoveries? Another new suggestion I am proposing here is that the 22nd Quartermaster Corps commemorative was struck over large-sized 50-centavos U.S./Philippines coins. This particular medal is dated to the “official” Fall of Manila (on Feburary 11, 1942) which obviously was well before the great dump and capitulation of Corregidor, but who is to say when exactly the medals were struck? The Homma Medal depicts a Japanese soldier gazing out presumedly at Corregidor as if the Island had yet to be overtaken. Again, when exactly was the medal made — was it after the initial limited Japanese recovery of the silver?

In their own right, recovered minor silver issues are legitimately rare. These are small coins, arguably less desirable in circulating and collecting circles of the past 60 years, and probably were carried farther with the ocean currents and were harder to pick up off the floor of the bay with the primitive methods used — shovels and “G.I.”garbage cans. No doubt these small coins were in the hoard, though — the proof is indelibly etched on the larger coins as they were found, lying one on top of another.

What unusual coins were likely found in the silver dump? We know the great majority were small-sized Pesos. The 1936 commemoratives & Wilson Medals were heavily salvaged and most at the time seem to have been set aside. In addition, salvaged 50-centavo coins are occasionally observed.

In addition to the romance of hidden treasure, these particular coins remain to tell the tale of the desperate early days of World War II. The tale of the salvage was first presented to the public in YANK magazine in November, 1945. PROCEEDINGS, the magazine of the U.S. Naval Institute, presented a scholarly summary of the recovery in 1958 and, finally, the story appeared as an adventure in Reader’s Digest in April, 1959 — a version which was later made into a movie in the Philippines (“Pacific Inferno”) in 1985 and starred football great Jim Brown.

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MICHAEL DOLNICK
1916-2010

Michael Dolnick, member 592, passed away October 27, 2010 at 94 years of age. Michael joined the Chicago Coin Club May 13, 1953, served as Secretary (1955-56), President (1963-64) and received the Literary Award (1962) and Medal of Merit (1961). Michael also served as custodian of coin slides for the American Numismatic Association (ANA) and received their Medal of Merit (1966). He was a member of the Central States Numismatic Society and life member in the ANA.

Michael collected international crowns and specialized in the coinage of Bavaria. He enjoyed writing and The Numismatist, The Centinel and Numismatic News frequently published his papers. He was a great admirer of renowned medalist and sculptor Paul Vincze. They exchanged correspondence and Michael prominently displayed in his home 8” bronze models created by Vincze. The models were Virgo and Sagittarius the zodiac signs of Michael and his wife, Sylvia.

Michael was born in Chicago, spent his growing up years in the Humboldt and Albany Park neighborhoods and graduated from Roosevelt High School. He went on to the University of Chicago where he received a bachelor’s and master’s degree in social service administration. He served in the U.S. Army (1943-46), attended Officer’s Training School and was company commander of a neuropsychiatric unit in a convalescent hospital that treated soldiers experiencing shell-shock, known today as post traumatic stress syndrome.

Following his discharge, Michael made a career in vocational rehabilitation. He worked for National Society for Crippled Children and Adults which became the Easter Seal Society. In 1965 he moved to Washington DC after accepting a position in the U.S. Government Department of Health, Education and Welfare. He worked through the Department of Rehabilitation Services and awarded grants to sheltered workshop facilities.

Michael also wrote a number of professional papers dealing with rehabilitation. In one instance, his profession and hobby were combined when the December 1954 issue of The Crippled Child magazine published his article “Coin Collecting for Relaxation and Profit,” encouraging handicapped people to take up the hobby.

Michael was a life long student and scholar. During retirement he took courses at the University of Maryland and Montgomery College. While taking a course on American history Michael amazed classmates with the announcement that he lived during the Great Depression. In 1982 he went on an archeology dig in the city of Caesarea, Israel.

Michael returned to Chicago in 2003. Survivors include Sylvia, his wife of 69 years, son Bill, daughter-in-law Rachel and three grandchildren Bria, Miriam and Solomon. Michael was buried at Shalom Memorial Park, Arlington Heights, IL.

Rabbi David Abramson summed up Michael’s life in saying, “He was a man devoted to the life of the mind, devoted to the downtrodden, devoted to making the world a better place, devoted to family…May his memory truly abide as a blessing.”

Carl Wolf, Secretary

Fourth Meeting of the ANA 2011 Convention Host Committee

November 17, 2010

Meeting called to order at 6:10 PM by Assistant General Chairman Mark Wieclaw. Meeting was held in the offices of Harlan J. Berk, 77 W. Washington, Chicago. Members enjoyed a delicious meal provided by Mr. Berk, who also reimbursed for parking. Also in attendance were Bill Burd, Richard Lipman, Eugene Freeman, David Simpson, Robert Weinstein, Paul Hybert, Elliott Kreiter, and Carl Wolf.

Committee Reports:
ANA Ambassadors (Robert Weinstein): He reports visiting several clubs. Interest is limited at this stage, with some clubs having dropped ANA membership and having few ANA members.

Branding (Bill Burd): The committee has a proposal on shirts, and will present it shortly to ANA. If the ANA doesn’t provide a sponsor, the local committee can do so.

Volunteers (Carl Wolf): There are about 50 volunteers signed up so far. Carl expects no trouble getting to 100, which is what we need. He has been putting volunteer names in an Excel list and will be contacting as needed for such information as shirt size and cell phone numbers.

Exhibits (Paul Hybert): He has been in touch with the Chief Judge, Joe Boling, but has nothing new at this point.

Medals (David Simpson): He has been copied on ANA email correspondence with a medal designer, so ANA is keeping the committee abreast of medal design progress. On another medal topic, Mr. Wolf priced getting new strikes of the club’s Lincoln plaquette. These might be used as presentation pieces for committee members or Numismatic Theater speakers. He also suggested the club look into coming up with a new medal to coincide with the convention. Mr. Wieclaw will present the idea to the club.

Numismatic Theater (Mike Gasvoda, written report): He recently contacted 11 prospective speakers via email, and got four positive responses. He has a list of 21 prospects. The committee sees a need for 24 speakers. Perhaps six prospects will first contact the ANA rather than this committee. The committee goal is that speakers will be lined up fairly quickly so they can be publicized. But the final list probably won’t go out to the public until July.

Outreach/Local Transportation (Elliott Kreiter): Nothing new.

Pages (Richard Lipman): His committee is still looking for clarification on the rules. He suggested he could contact dealers, who often supply pages, to let them know about the program. One idea is to include pages information in a pre-show newsletter to dealers. Such a newsletter was sent prior to the Boston Convention.

Scout Workshops (Eugene Freeman): He recently spoke to a large local Boy Scout troop. Two Girl Scout councils have already sent out information to their local leaders. He is still working on getting the Boy Scout leadership involved. He may attend a monthly meeting for Boy Scout leaders. He will work on arranging give-aways for the scouts. He will check with the ANA about getting a floor tour, perhaps of the US Mint exhibit, for the scouts. His hope is that up to 500 scouts could attend the workshops.

No reports were available for Patrons and Non-Competitive Exhibits.

Regarding pre-convention newsletters, Mr. Simpson anticipated nothing would be needed until early next year. He advised committee members that the first newsletter might include reports from the various committee chairmen.

Mr. Wolf suggested the club put together a list of local places to visit. The list could be handed out at the convention. That sort of information could also be included in the pre-convention newsletters.

The next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, January 19. ANA staff will be present at the meeting, which will be held at a Rosemont hotel. Time is tentatively 6:00. The meeting may not include a meal. Members will receive details before the meeting.

Meeting concluded at 7:15 PM.

Happy holidays!

Respectfully submitted,
David Simpson

Next Meeting of the ANA 2011 Convention Host Committee

January 19, 2011

Our next ANA 2011 Committee meeting will be held January 19, 2011, from 7:00 to 9:00 p.m., in Rosemont, IL. Light desserts and coffee will be served. We should plan to meet before the Committee meeting for dinner. Further details, the meeting location, and an agenda will be announced to the Committee soon.

In attendance will be Rhonda Scurek, Kim Kiick, Larry Shepherd, and Cliff Mishler, in addition to the 2011 Committee. We will start off with introductions, then proceed with our usual agenda of committee reports. Also on the agenda will be a discussion as to how to allocate our budget among complimentary rooms, parking, refreshments, etc. The ANA staff members present will respond to any questions anyone has as to the division of responsibilities for the success of the convention between our committee and ANA Headquarters staff.

This will be an opportunity for all of us to meet ANA Executive Director Larry Shepherd. Larry has done wonders in turning the ANA around, and it is a privilege to work with him. Convention Planner Rhonda Scurek, an experienced professional, is looking forward to utilizing our Committee’s strengths to make a statement in Chicago. Kim Kiick is a Senior Administrative Manager at the ANA and a key figure in convention planning. And it will be good to welcome back Cliff Mishler, a member of our own club, in his capacity as President of the American Numismatic Association. I hope to see you all there!

Bob Leonard
General Chairman
Chicago World’s Fair of Money 2011

Our 1105th Meeting

Important Dates

Chatter Matter

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CHICAGO COIN CLUB
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