The American Numismatic Association’s School of Numismatics will offer its Fundamentals of Grading United States Coins, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Nov. 8-9 during Coinfest in Stamford, Conn.

Students will learn and understand how U.S. coins should be graded according to the latest ANA and market standards during this highly enriched two-day seminar. Participants will gain confidence in evaluating surface marks, strike, luster and eye appeal through interactive discussions, group activities and individual study of hundreds of coins from the ANA grading set.

“A well-rounded education is the foundation of any successful collector,” said ANA Executive Director Larry Shepherd. “Courses like Fundamentals of Grading United States Coins can teach hobbyists skills and information that will save them thousands on the bourse floor.”

Summer Seminar instructor Lane J. Brunner, Ph.D., will teach the course. Tuition is $345 for ANA members and $445 for all others. Become an ANA member at www.money.org. To register for Fundamentals of Grading United States Coins, call 719-482-9857 or visit www.money.org and select “School of Numismatics” from the “Numismatic Events” drop- down menu.

Pattern coins and the precious metals markets are the topics of the next two, free Professional Numismatists Guild (PNG) “Share the Knowledge” educational seminars. They will be conducted, respectively, by PNG member-dealers Andy Lustig and Richard Nachbar at the Central States Numismatic Society convention (CSNS) in April and at the Long Beach Coin, Stamp & Collectibles Expo in May.

A complimentary light lunch will be available for audience members at both PNG seminars.

Lustig of Nyack, New York is a co-founder of The Society of U.S. Pattern Collectors. He will present “Collecting Pattern Coinage” starting at 11 a.m. on Friday, April 18, 2008 in room 42 of the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, 5555 N. River Rd., Rosemont, Illinois, the site of the 69th Annual CSNS Convention.

“Patterns are some of the rarest coins struck by the United States Mint. The series has more than 2,000 different prototypes for American coinage including patterns, die trials and experimental pieces. This half hour seminar will provide an overview of the series, historical background, collecting strategies and a superb slide show of great rarities,” Lustig said.

The annual spring PNG Day will be held in conjunction with the CSNS show on Wednesday, April 16. Collectors may obtain free, printed PNG Day invitations from PNG member-dealers. An online membership directory is available at www.PNGdealers.com, or call PNG Executive Director Robert Brueggeman at (760) 728-1300. (more…)

After reading a recent post by Nathan Elkins on the American Numismatic Society discussion list, I had serious concerns that I might be suffering from a severe case of delusion or dementia. Mr. Elkins proposes to orchestrate a panel of archaeologists to discuss “Contextual Numismatics” at the 2009 AIA meeting.

Granted, I have only been a professional numismatist for 41 years, but I rather thought that I might have heard most of the terminology used in the field. So, I hopped over to that repository of all human knowledge, Google, and searched for the term—hoping to bring myself up to speed. Ouch, not a single hit.

Just to make sure my browser was working, I searched for something everyone has heard of “Ilkhanid Coins”. Bingo, 648 links. Ok, one more “Russian wire money”, 489 more links. Contextual Numismatics? — Zip. This, I thought, ought to be a lively discussion panel. Perhaps I was unfair to search a general resource for an academic term. So, back to the browser I went and pulled up the American Numismatic Society web site. Searching for “contextual numismatics” I found zero documents. Finally, I tried the Archaeological Institute of America web site: “Your search yielded 0 results.”

The term is apparently unknown to anyone but Mr. Elkins. It should be interesting to see how the discussion goes when the subject is undefined and unknown. (more…)

This world-class collection of Ancient and World coins will be auctioned by Ira and Larry Goldberg on May 24-28, 2008 at the Crowne Plaza Beverly Hills and on Ebay Live.

Catalogues prices will be $15 US each, $30 International, or $40 US, $60 Int. for the entire set of 3. Catalogues: Ancient Coins, European Coins, and New World Coins (including Africa, Asia, and Oceana). Tentative date for catalogue availability is April 1, 2008. Call 1-800-978-2646 to place your order. (Subscriptions will include this catalogue.)

Because of the intense worldwide interest in this collection, we strongly suggest you make your hotel arrangements and bidding arrangements as soon as possible.

The Millennia Collection is now a featured gallery on the NGC website. Click here to view the gallery.

This gallery presents just a small sampling of the variety and extraordinary rarities that are included. Many predictions suggest that when the Millennia Collection sells, it will become the most valuable collection of world coins ever sold.

Selected examples from the collection formed the raison d’etre for Whitman’s recent award winning Money of the World: Coins That Made History, a gorgeous, full-color coffee table book co-edited by Ira and Larry Goldberg. The National Literary Guild awarded “Best World Coin Book” for 2007. This book presents coins as objects of purpose and importance, as well as having a fascinating history attached to them. The entire Millennia Collection far exceeds the hundred or so coins presented within this book, however; it is with nearly a century’s worth of cumulative collecting effort and skill that this astonishing array of over a thousand numismatic treasures have come to light.

The second and third in a year-long series of free Professional Numismatists Guild “Share the Knowledge” educational seminars will be conducted in conjunction with the Whitman Baltimore Coin and Currency Convention on February 29, 2008 and at the American Numismatic Association’s National Money Show™ in Phoenix on March 8, 2008. A complimentary light lunch will be available at both programs.

Robert Rhue of Denver, Colorado, a member of the PNG Board of Directors, will present a seminar entitled, “Collecting Coins, Medals and Tokens From the Back of the Redbook,” at Noon on Friday, February 29. The one-hour program will be conducted in room 303 of the Baltimore Convention Center.

“If you want to learn about many interesting areas of numismatics apart from Federal issue coinage, come to this short overview seminar on ‘the back of the Redbook’ (the popular, annual reference, A Guide Book of the United States Coins). Knowledge is king, and knowing more about Territorial coins, Lesher dollars, errors, patterns, Hawaiian coinage and other fun, esoteric areas, might just someday present an opportunity for you that could translate into a pleasant financial reward,” said Rhue.

Internationally known bank note expert, Tom Denly of Boston, also a member of the PNG Board, will present a seminar entitled, “The History of U.S. Paper Money and How to Collect It,” at Noon on Saturday, March 8, at the ANA’s National Money Show in room 102-A of the Phoenix Convention Center West Building. (more…)