Hard Times

GS and jom, fantastico!

HT (who likes coins)

Recent additions.......

Best, HT

Thanks Hunter!

Picked this up in the CICF auction last week. It arrived yesterday and I snapped some photos...

 

Brandon that is simply a stunner! But no horse!

Yarm, try as I might, I have been wanting to get a County Durham token for years. Yours is amazing!

Best, HT

Tracing dies and die states in Conder tokens. Both the obverse and reverse dies of the Middlesex 383 were used prior to be combined for this one. The 383 is 'scarce', meaning 75-200 known. The 378a is 'RR', meaning 11 to 30 known. The Irish token is also 'scarce'. The combination of these 5 tokens in a collection, probably unique. All this for fractions of pennies on the dollar of US issued coppers of these times in these grades.

Best, HT

Nice Brandon, the expansion of my End of Pain farthings with the addition of this one, which goes with the other two below it.

Best, HT

I agree with Brandon. And of course, Bob knows how to capture it well!

Best, HT

Stunners all........

Best, HT

Very nice flatwoods!!

Best, HT

For something completely different, here are some other types of coppers. Enjoy the holidays.

Best, HT

And a repunched date as well...........

CM I am guessing yours explodes in mega flash under the light? I have never seen a 67 Conder in hand, it must be something!

Best, HT

This is my only GB Token:

 

NGC MS67BN

 

Very nice CM! here is mine for comparison.....

Best, HT

Very nice yarm, I love the spence farthings - here is another one with the same reverse.

Best, HT

 

 

Hard Times, there are some Conder tokens that were struck so as to produce a convex surface. Is that what I'm seeing on the obverse of your M312b?

 

yarm

Yes this is one of them. This a a specious token - fictitious vendor, that Bell says was made for collectors. It shares the same reverse as the Rye token I posted earlier, also specious. The Rye token is listed as 30 made, this one has an R rating, so 30 to 75 made. The concave, or convex up (upward bulge to the center point from the rims) obverse is hard to image because of the reflections of the light source. I used 4 lights here to even it out.

Best, HT

And now for something completely different.........

Here is a bland, ugly, boring, dark dime I picked up. It does have booming luster, ocean teal to gold toning, and a big D though...... Used to be R5, now R3. Reverse streaks are on the slab which I need to polish better.

Best, HT

Here is another Groll pick up from ANA, very different toning on the obverse and reverse:

Hard Times-That is an interesting pair! Can there be a Die State III?

 

Farthing- Nice pieces! So far, you're only the third US collector who I've noticed has posted Baldwin's basement purchases.

Yarm that is a good question - Gary Groll told me that the latest Baldwin's sale (Auction 92, 9/14) he had catalogued had additional die states. Lots 126-130 have the same obverse with shattered die, it looks like what he called Die State II for my token is the latest die state, the Die State I is earlier than some of those shown in the Baldwin's sale.

Best, HT

John Lusk's new book is a great one. I worked through it 2 full times back when it was released earlier this year, and it's a joy to look at and read. Some interesting stories, and his write-up about and execution of edge lettering photos is superb!

 

(thumbs u

Have not started reading it yet, got a personally signed copy from John at ANA. Look forward to it, he put 10 years of work into this book, many trips to England to sleuth out answers about the tokens.

Best, HT