Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt, Jr. became the 26th President of the United States on September 14, 1901 following the assassination of William McKinley. Prior to becoming president, Roosevelt was a deputy sheriff in the Dakota Territory, Police Commissioner of New York City, U.S. Civil Service Commissioner, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, and Colonel of the Rough Riders for which he was awarded the Medal of Honor. Roosevelt was elected to the New York State Assembly, Governor of New York, and Vice President of the United State. In fact, his nomination as vice president to run with William McKinley by the Republican Party was to get him out of New York because he was reforming the status quo out of existence.
On September 14, 1901, at 42 years and 322 days of age, Roosevelt became the youngest President when McKinley was assassinated (Kennedy was the youngest elected president when he was inaugurated at 43 years, 236 days). As president he was a trust buster, conservationist, and his slogan of “Speak softly and carry a big stick” set the tone for military and foreign policy that even impacts today’s policies. Roosevelt was the first U.S. citizen and sitting president to win the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the 1905 peace treaty ending the Russo-Japanese War.
Augustus Saint-Gaudens designed the $10 Indian Head gold eagle that was first released in 1907.
Roosevelt initiated the “Golden Age of American Coin Design.” Using his bully pulpit, he held the designs of the U.S. Mint Chief Engraver Charles E. Barber in contempt. In fact, Roosevelt had called Barber’s designs “atrociously hideous.” Roosevelt ordered coinage whose designs were more than 25 years old to be redesigned. Roosevelt was a fan of sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens and asked him to help redesign American coinage.
After Saint-Gaudens died of cancer, Roosevelt continued to look to revitalize U.S. coinage. He seized upon Abraham Lincoln’s 100th birthday to redesign the small cent. He was steered to Victor David Brenner, whose bust of Lincoln was used as the model for the new Lincoln Cent first issued in 1909. Not only was Lincoln the first president to appear on a circulating coin, but Brenner’s obverse design is still in use today.
Roosevelt called his coinage redesign his “pet crime.”
1991 Mount Rushmore Golden Anniversary Silver Dollar
Interestingly, the 2013 Mount Rushmore National Memorial quarter that will be released later this year will only show Washington and Jefferson during its sculpture. Lincoln and Roosevelt are not part of this image.
Teddy is now featured on the current one-dollar coin. The coin has a portrait Roosevelt facing to his right that even gives the impression of someone looking into the distance. It is fitting for a man who was always looking forward to preservation of America’s ideals and its place as a world leader.
Teddy Roosevelt is my favorite president for many reasons including his view on coin designs. BULLY!
Credits
2013 Theodore Roosevelt Dollar and 1991 Mount Rushmore Golden Anniversary Commemorative Silver Dollar images courtesy of the U.S. Mint.
I just received an email from the American Numismatic Association saying that the Board of Governors announced that they will not extend the contract of Executive Director Jeff Shevlin.
“After considering the Board’s mission and objectives, the Board of Governors concluded that Mr. Shevlin was not the right fit to lead the Association going forward,” Hallenbeck said. “The board felt that it was in the Association’s best interest to sever our relationship and seek new leadership for the Association.”
Unless Jeff did something wrong that the Board is not telling us, this is the wrong decision bordering on downright foolish!
I have had a working relationship with Jeff for more than a year participating with the ANA Technology Committee. I have found Jeff to be incredibly accommodating and wanting nothing but the best for the ANA. He had taken on the role with the ANA Technology Committee as a volunteer before being interviewed and hired as the organizations after being a college professor. In our conversations, he described being the ANA’s executive director as his dream job.
Jeff relocates to Colorado Springs to take over an organization whose last two executive directors were “dismissed” for various reasons. Both of his predecessors pursued legal action against the ANA. Christopher Chipoletti’s suit was settled a few years ago, Larry Shepherd filed his case last December.
What did Jeff do wrong to not be renewed?
Jeff initiated the work to start to bring the ANA into the 21st century by looking at its technology infrastructure. He is concerned that the aging population of the ANA cannot sustain the organization that is not attracting enough younger members. Jeff knows that the way to engage the younger members is to use technology to get them involved and keep them engaged.
Jeff is an enthusiastic ambassador for the hobby. Nicknamed the “So-Called Guy” for his interest and work on So-Called Dollars. So-called Dollars are medals approximately the size of a silver dollar that were struck to commemorate a U.S. historical event. Jeff and Bill Hyder co-wrote Discover the World of CHARBNEAU SO-CALLED DOLLARS. Jeff was a collector. Jeff was one of us.
Maybe that was his problem. Jeff was a collector and not a dealer. While dealers are an important part of the ANA, the dealers do not have buyers without a strong collecting community. Dealers need the collectors as much as the collectors need the dealers. However, the dealer population is limited compared with the potential number of collectors, researchers, and other interested people that could be members of the ANA.
From my perspective, Jeff was doing everything right to help the ANA recover some of its past problems. The ANA has to be an all inclusive organization and think about the collectors and not just the business. The ANA needs to be more open and be able to reach out. The only way to do that in today’s environment is to use technology. Jeff understood that and understood that the ANA has to look at the organization as a whole and find balance.
This move represents everything that has been wrong with the Board of Governors over the last 10 years and have shown that this board has done little to work on the issues that I referenced in my platform.
Rather than set clear policies and goals (one of planks of my platform), the current Board seemingly used Jeff to figure out what to do next. This is NOT how to run a national organization. There are no clear goals, policies, or objectives. If they were the Board would not be in this situation.
Unless the ANA Board of Governors has something more tangible than saying that Jeff “was not the right fit,” it appears that the Board of Governors has once again failed the ANA membership making it time to replace the entire Board of Governors.
The redesign of the $100 note was announced with a press release that was to be held on April 21, 2010 at the Department of the TreasuryCash Room with all of the usual suspects: then Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System Ben Bernanke, Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios, and the since retired Director of the United States Secret Service Mark Sullivan.
The date of the announcement, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and Federal Reserve announced that Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board Ben S. Bernanke said, “When the new design $100 note is issued on February 10, 2011, the approximately 6.5 billion older design $100s already in circulation will remain legal tender.”
Throughout the summer of 2010, the BEP and Federal Reserve released a lot of training and education materials in anticipation of the release of the new notes.
Everything seemed to be going well until October 1, 2010 when the Federal Reserve “announced a delay in the issue date of the redesigned $100 note.” The Federal Reserve and BEP said that there was a problem with creasing of the paper during the printing process. That was the last we heard from the Federal Reserve until today’s announcement.
Magnified images of the creasing showing up on the new $100 notes.
We consider the delayed introduction of the NexGen $100 note to be a production failure that potentially could have been avoided and has already resulted in increased costs. We found that BEP did not (1) perform necessary and required testing to resolve technical problems before starting full production of the NexGen $100 note, (2) implement comprehensive project management for the NexGen $100 note program, and (3) adequately complete a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis for the disposition of the approximately 1.4 billion finished NexGen $100 notes already printed but not accepted by FRB. [Federal Reserve Board]
After the report noted that the BEP basic responded by saying that they were sorry and are looking into it, the OIG caved and said that even though the BEP was bad, the corrective actions “are responsive to our recommendations.”
Then nothing. No follow up by the OIG or the Government Accountability Office. In fact, we have not heard from the GAO since their 2005 report suggesting whether a second supplier of currency paper is needed (see GAO-05-368).
Of course it is easy for the BEP to say that Crane & Co., the Dalton, Massachusetts company that has been the exclusive currency paper supplier since 1879, because it would be easy to justify. Some of the arguments against finding a second supplier includes the cost of entering the market and the established relationship with Crane who the BEP allows to “own” the innovations paid with taxpayer money. There was also the case of having two of the most powerful senators, Ted Kennedy and John Kerry, there to protect Crane. Neither are the senators from Massachusetts today.
While the BEP has been struggling with rag-bond paper, countries have been moving to using polymer “paper.”. The polymer “paper” was developed by the Reserve Bank of Australia to enhance the durability of the notes and to incorporate security features not possible with paper or rag-based paper. RBA has been distributing polymer notes since 1992. While the polymer substrate costs little more and the production is only marginally more expensive, the benefit will come from the reduction in counterfeiting and the durability of the note. Polymer will last three-to-six times longer than rag-based paper.
The Bank of Canada has reissued its C$100, C$50, and C$20 notes using the polymer paper and will issue the new C$5 and C$10 notes later this year.
Switching to polymer notes, especially for higher denominations, would be a better decision. It will reduce counterfeiting and reduce the costs over the lifetime of the note. And there is no law that would prevent the Federal Reserve from using the polymer paper.
Considering the Bureau of Engraving and Printing’s previous performance with the $100 notes, this should not be consider the time to celebrate. Especially since a pre-solicitation notice asking for information about purchasing a Single Note Inspection System is still open at FedBizOpps.gov and the BEP has not issued a request for proposal (RFP) to purchase such a system. Let’s wait for the BEP to deliver the notes to the Federal Reserve for distribution before considering this a success.
While waiting, enjoy this video announcement narrated by Federal Reserve Deputy Associate Director Michael Lambert about the new release date.
Images courtesy of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. Video courtesy of the Federal Reserve.
The case involves the sale of 70 artifacts from Arizona’s Hopi Tribe by the Paris auction house Néret-Minet. Hopi tribe members and historians believe that the items were illegally obtained. Representatives from Néret-Minet claim that the items were purchased legally from a collector in the United States.
A visitor looks at antique tribal masks revered as sacred ritual artifacts by a Native American tribe in Arizona which are displayed at an auction house in Paris April 11, 2013. (REUTERS/John Schults)
Following the ruling, Néret-Minet went ahead with the auction. According to The New York Times, the auction generated $1.2 million in sales (with buyer’s premiums). Five of the 70 items did not sell and not sold for less than their estimated value.
According to The New York Times:
Before starting, the auctioneer, Gilles Néret-Minet, told the crowd that the sale had been found by a judge to be perfectly legal, and that the objects were no longer sacred but had become “important works of art.” He added, “In France you cannot just up and seize the property of a person that is lawfully his.”
So let me get this straight, religious objects that are allegedly protected by the same treaties as ancient coins and United States law can be sold as “art objects” while foreign governments confront a dealer on a bourse floor while the State Department does little to protect collectors and those who have legitimate claims?
If France can do this with items of religious and cultural significance to the Hopi tribe, then will happen to the coin collecting hobby? I know some people can take their hobby seriously, but it is not religion. Most countries already have examples of the coins in question, so why are additional examples “culturally significant.” Remember, it was reported that when a dealer was approached in Baltimore by representatives of a foreign government, they were only interested in the more expensive coins and not the common coins from the same country with a lesser value.
The State Department is not doing enough to protect the American people, whether it is to protect what is really culturally significant items like the artifacts from the Hopi tribe or the abuse of international law as demonstrated by the actions of the State Department’s CPAC and the confrontation in Baltimore. This is something that must be addressed by the president!
Please take action!
I renew my request that all of my readers to go to http://wh.gov/MD2O and sign the petition. Share it on social media. I made it easy—just see the widget at the top of the right column. Petitions require 100,000 signatures in order to be answered by the White House. So far there are five signatures (THANK YOU!). Let’s see if we can motivate the coin collecting community to add more before you will not be able to own any foreign coin older than 100 years old!
A French supporter of the Indian cause, who refused to give his name, left, holds a flag of the American Indian Movement and an American exchange student, member of the Arizona’s Hopi tribe, Bo Lomahquahu, right, stand outside of the Druout’s auction house to protest the auction of Native American Hopi tribe masks in Paris, Friday, April 12, 2013. A contested auction of dozens of Native American tribal masks went ahead Friday afternoon following a Paris court ruling, in spite of appeals for a delay by the Hopi tribe, its supporters including actor Robert Redford, and the U.S. government. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)
Welcome to National Coin Week. This year, from April 21 through April 27, the National Coin Week theme is “Black Diamond Strikes Again” to celebrate the 100th Anniversary of the introduction of James Earle Fraser’s Buffalo nickel.
According to legend, Black Diamond was Fraser’s model for the reverse of the Buffalo nickel. Black Diamond was a North American bison that was living in the Central Park Zoo. He was donated to the zoo by Barnum and Bailey and lived his life there until he was auctioned in 1915 to a game and poultry dealer who was later sold as steaks for $2 a pound.
James Earle Fraser, ca. 1920
When asked about the model for the coin, Fraser said it was Black Diamond and found him in the Bronx Zoo. At one time Fraser was not sure of the name of the animal but insisted his influence was at the Bronx Zoo. Black Diamond was never at the Bronx Zoo.
But like the story of who was the model for the Indian on the obverse, why should facts spoil a good story!
In Roman Numerals, one thousand is represented as “M.”
For the computer geeks, one thousand can be written as 1111101000 in binary, 01750 in octal (base 8), and 0x3E8 in hexadecimal (base 16).
If “A picture is worth a thousand words,” then what would one thousand blog posts be worth? You are reading what I never thought would occur. This is the one thousandth post to the Coin Collectors Blog!
When I started this blog on October 29, 2005, there were few websites for coin collectors. Back then, the numismatic publications were barely online and mostly as a place to subscribe to their print editions. Since starting this blog, there has been a growth in numismatic news outlets and other information. Rather than reporting the news, I moved to a little more analysis and opinion on the numismatic news of the day while keeping with other collecting information.
I like to think I started a trend but there are a lot of smart people out there with ideas of their own. I welcome them to online numismatic community.
It has been 7 years, 5 months, 16 days since my first post. I have had a lot of fun writing about my experiences, looking at the numismatic community, reporting some news, providing some analysis, and writing about whatever comes to mind. After all this time I can say that I am still having fun!
To those who have been around from the beginning, thank you for staying with me.
To those who joined since the beginning, thank you for reading.
As with many announcements, there was little news other that what was published in the past. The U.S. Mint did bring out a plaster model of a curved coin to show the media what it could potentially look like.
The following video shows the plaster model of the coin and the introduction by Treasurer of the United States Rosie Rios:
This is the animation that the U.S. Mint published showing the shape of the coin:
But the real news of the day is the comedy routine by Brooks Robinson. Robinson takes his sense of humor to a deprecating sense of self. It is worth watching!
Remember, this week’s poll asks if you are going to participate in this contest. Are you?
Will you try to submit a design for the National Baseball Hall of Fame commemorative?
No, I am not artistic enough. (54%, 7 Votes)
No, it's a dumb idea. (38%, 5 Votes)
Yes I am! (8%, 1 Votes)
I would like to, but I do not have the time. (0%, 0 Votes)
Maybe, I am thinking about it. (0%, 0 Votes)
Total Voters: 13
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Videos from the launch ceremony courtesy of Gannett by Brian Tumulty. Animation video courtesy of the U.S. Mint.
In a test lawsuit filed by the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild (ACCG), the group sued the federal government over the granting of import restrictions and confiscation of coins that foreign government have declared cultural property. The suit filed by ACCG challenges recent Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the State Department and the cultural regulators of Cypress and China under the Convention on Cultural Property. On March 25, 2013, the case that ACCG appealed to the Supreme Court was denied a hearing (petition for certiorari).
EID·MAR silver coin commemorating the death of Cæsar on March 15
Although this may sound reasonable, Article 1 paragraph (e) of the treaty defines a category of cultural property as “antiquities more than one hundred years old, such as inscriptions, coins and engraved seals.” This means that any coin minted before 1913 can be considered cultural property and not only be subject to restrictions but confiscated.
Under the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act (CPIA; 19 U.S.C. §§ 2601 et seq.), the law passed by congress upon the Senate’s ratification of the treaty in 1983, requests are reviewed by the Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC) in the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. The CPAC authors the MOU based on the input from the requesting country and publishes the results for public comment. By law, the public has 30 days to provide comments on the proposed MOU. However, it appears that it is very rare that the CPAC makes any changes after the end of the comment period.
The MOU undergoes whatever department review is required and then is signed by the Secretary of State on behalf of the president and made part of the policy and rule provisions granted to the Executive Branch by congress (as part of the CPIA).
The original case was filed in a Fourth Circuit Federal Court in Baltimore. In its suit, ACCG claims that the rules agreed to the by CPAC are arbitrary and made by a panel that does not understand how their decisions affect coin collectors. Even though the intent has not to work against ancient coin collectors, governments have used the law to restrict the export of newly discovered ancient to the United States. The court ruled that it did not have standing to change the law since there is no constitutional question. The appellate division of the Fourth Circuit in Richmond confirmed this ruling in October 2012.
ACCG appealed the ruling to the Supreme Court. On March 25, the court denied the ACCG’s petition for hearing. The Supreme Court’s action means that the result of the test case is only binding in the Fourth Circuit (Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia). In other words, someone has to have been harmed by the results of the law before the courts will agree to hear a case.
Last month, Patrick Heller wrote in Numismatic News that he spoke with a dealer “who had been visited by representatives of a foreign government seeking to confiscate the valuable ancient coins issued by that nation if the dealer could not provide a chain of custody proving that the coins were legally owned before that nation banned the export of ‘national treasures.’” Heller said that the representative were only interested in the more expensive coins and not the common coins from the same country but whose value was much less.
While these issues have mostly affected ancient coin dealers and collectors, some countries have attempted to petition the United States government to make the cut-off date of what is considered cultural property for coins later. In one case, China has suggested that coins from as late as the Qing Dynasty (1644-1912) should be considered cultural property but has not petitioned the CPAC for an update to their MOU with the United States. The problem is that these countries have been trying to exercise their “authority” under the 1970 convention putting U.S. dealers and collectors at disadvantage with the rest of world for political reasons.
If the State Department’s CPAC will not work on behalf of the American people, then collectors must stand up and tell the Obama administration it is time to stop. In fact, I created a petition at the White House website. This petition reads as follows:
we petition the obama administration to: Protect coin collectors from countries using cultural property to prevent the fair trade of ancient rare coins
Using the Convention on Cultural Property Implementation Act, foreign countries have been asking the State Department’s Cultural Property Advisory Committee to update Memoranda of Understand in such a way that could harm the ancient coin collecting in the United States by declaring coins “Cultural Property” under the 1970 UNESCO convention. The problem is that these countries are only asking the US for restrictions.
In a recent case, a dealer was confronted at a coin show by foreign officials seeking to confiscate expensive ancient coins under a loose interpretation of the law. This is going to harm the small business coin dealers involved.
We the undersigned ask the administration to end the restrictions on the buying and selling of foreign coins mistakenly included in these acts.
Please take action!
I ask all of my readers to go to http://wh.gov/MD2O and sign the petition. And share it on social media. Petitions require 100,000 signatures in order to be answered by the White House. So far there is one signature (mine). Let’s see if we can motivate the coin collecting community to add more before you will not be able to own any foreign coin older than 100 years old!
Logo courtesy of the Ancient Coin Collectors Guild.
Image of the Eid Mar silver coin courtesy of dig4coins.com.
As a result of the the president signed the National Baseball Hall of Fame Commemorative Coin Act (Public Law No. 112-152 [TXT][PDF]), the U.S. Mint is required to hold a competition for the design of the obverse (heads) side of the three coins that will be issued as part of the set. The law states:
IN GENERAL- The Secretary shall hold a competition to determine the design of the common obverse of the coins minted under this Act, with such design being emblematic of the game of baseball.
SELECTION AND APPROVAL- Proposals for the design of coins minted under this Act may be submitted in accordance with the design selection and approval process developed by the Secretary in the sole discretion of the Secretary. The Secretary shall encourage 3-dimensional models to be submitted as part of the design proposals.
PROPOSALS- As part of the competition described in this subsection, the Secretary may accept proposals from artists, engravers of the United States Mint, and members of the general public.
COMPENSATION- The Secretary shall determine compensation for the winning design under this subsection, which shall be not less than $5,000. The Secretary shall take into account this compensation amount when determining the sale price described in section 6(a).
Here is your chance to design a coin that will be sold to collectors everywhere and if you create the winning design, you will win $5,000!
The obverse design must represent baseball and include the inscriptions “Liberty,” “In God We Trust,” and “2014.”
Your design must be able to look good on a coin about the size of a nickel, which is close to the size of the $5 gold coin.
You must be a 14 years old and older, a U.S. citizen or permanent resident to enter. Employees in any area of the Department of the Treasury, current and former members of the Artistic Infusion Program, and contractor to the Department of the Treasury are ineligible.
Your design must not depict any real person, name, logo, stadium, field, etc. from now or in the past. It must be original artwork.
When you are ready to submit your entries, you must submit your line art in black and while (no color) to http://www.batterup.challenge.gov/. This site is not up but will be there, ready to accept your submissions on April 11 starting at noon EDT. Deadline is May 11, 2013 at noon EDT. You can also submit a plaster or plastic model approximately 8-inches in diameter.
Do not procrastinate because the U.S. Mint has said that if 10,000 entries are received prior the May 11 deadline, they will suspend the contest early with 48 hours notice. They also said that the contest will not end before noon EDT of April 26.
If you have an idea give it a try! You do not have to be that artistic because the engravers at the U.S. Mint can translate your design into something that can be struck into coins. They are good, so give it a try!
While we are talking about the design of these coin, will you try to submit a design for this commemorative? Let me know in this week’s poll:
To understand the post’s true condition, you have to consider the following:
The Chairman of the Federal Reserve is Ben S. Bernanke. His first name is really Ben, not Benjamin.
The law requires the Federal Reserve to distribute the one-dollar note. Only congress can vote to stop producing the note.
The Acting Director of the U.S. Mint is Richard A. Peterson, not Pederson.
Seignorage is deposited in the Public Enterprise Fund. No, the leaving out of the “d” in the original post was not a typo because I was having fun!
The Director of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing is Larry Felix. I do not know a Larry Felinks. Maybe he is a long lost cousin of the director?
The company that supplies currency paper to the BEP is “Crane and Company.” The Sandhill Crane Company does not exist, but there is a bird called the sandhill crane. There is also a blue crane, but I am reasonably sure that there is no such person as Violet “Blue” Crane; or at least there is not one associated with Crane and Company. Maybe there is a Blue Crane working for Sandhill Crane? There is a joke in there that can use “Whooping Crane” which I will leave as an exercise to the reader!
Finally, when was the last time you heard the Fed Chairman concerned with coin collectors? The last line was added to emphasize the date.
In other words:
Besides, who is giving a blogger an exclusive story that does not appear elsewhere? Like the Orson Well’s broadcast of The War of the Worlds, all you had to do is change the channel (or check another source).
Even though the Presidential $1 Coins have been relegated to collector coins, numismatists should celebrate the release of the Theodore Roosevelt dollar coin.
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