Our coin club's March 4^th membership meeting saw the following members voted in for our 10^th Year Board:

• President Roy Brown

• Vice President John Larson

• Secretary Larry Nakata

• Treasurer Robert Hall

• Board Member Mike Orr

• Board Member Ann Brown

• Board Member Bruce Gamble

Congratulations go out to these people for volunteering their time and effort to make our coin club a successful organization.

For this month, your editors want to remind all of our members to get their orders in for their Anchorage Coin Club 10^th Year Commemorative Coin set. Orders have been placed for some 57 numbered sets at this time. Club member, Mike Robuck (also the owner of the Alaska Mint), will be minting these numbered sets in time for our club's April 1^st; meeting. Members have until the end of March to place their orders. Cost of the set will be $30. Be sure to get your orders placed!

In other news Roy Brown is working to set up a coin show at the University Mall during National Coin Week. At this time we have a request into the mall management for either the weekend before or the weekend after National Coin Week (April 19-25). We should shortly be getting word from the management on availability and on requirements for setup of a show at their mall. Interested members wishing to get tables for the coin show can contact Ann Brown (Ph# 563-6708). Ann is presently taking reservations for tables at this time. By our April 1^st membership meeting we should have word as to whether or not the coin show will occur.

Our April 1^st club meeting will feature a presentation by club member Larry Nakata on "The Most Desirable U.S. Key Date Coins of the 20^th Century".

Have you ever wondered what the 1909-S VDB and 1955 Doubled die Lincoln cents look like?! Have you ever seen the 1937-D Three Legged Buffalo Nickel?! Larry will be bringing in a selection of about 15 of the most sought after U.S. coins of the 20^th century: Indian cents, Liberty nickels, Mercury dimes, Barber quarters, and many others. Be sure to come to this particular meeting. It's not often one sees so many key date coins in one location.

Our April 1^st meeting will also see our club's new raffle prize, an 1899 $5 Silver Certificate graded in Fine condition. For those of you not acquainted with U. S. Paper currency, this is a very popular note that is in high demand. This is a note that features the face of Chief "One Papa" and would be an excellent addition to anyone's collection. Who knows...you may be as member Brad Webb who won our last raffle prize (an ANACS slabbed 1937 Walking Liberty Half Dollar graded MS-65) with the purchase of one ticket that evening. Raffle tickets are $5 each for this popular note.

Ancient: Greek Athenian Owl

Finally, we want to make an announcement that our annual YN Donation Auction is scheduled for our club's May 6^th membership meeting. Donated coins and numismatic items (such as coin supplies and books) will be auctioned that evening. Anyone wishing to donate items for the auction can contact member Larry Nakata or one of the Anchorage Coin Club board members. A list of the donated items (and the contributors) will be posted in next month's newsletter. Proceeds from the auction will go towards the club's YN Education Fund.

Hope to see more of you at the April 10^th meeting.......

        Larry.

Editors' Note: Member Bill D'Atri gave an excellent presentation on "Coinage of the 2^nd Punic War" at our club's March 4^th membership meeting, There was a handout given out by Bill as part of his presentation. The handout proved to be very informative and certainly worthy of printing in this month's newsletter. Your Chief Editor even found some Roman coins from that era while browsing the Internet.

What was the Second Punic War? It was the second in a series of three wars between Carthage and Rome. The Second Punic War lasted from 219 to 204 BC. The battlegrounds ranged throughout Europe and North Africa, from the walls of Rome, to Nova Carthago (New Carthage, in Modern Spain), to Carthaginian territory in North Africa.

Is (here any historical significance in this conflict? Most certainly. The Punic Wars, which ended with the destruction of Carthage in 146 BC, stopped the diaspora of Punic culture throughout the Mediterranean, and propelled the Romans into an expansionist mode that led to the Roman Empire. Our current historical perspective is a direct result of this series of wars that occurred well over two thousand years ago.

Roman Republic / Silver Quadrigatus / ca. 225-212 BC. Introduced between the 1^st and 2^nd Punic Wars, replacing the earlier didrachm. The upheaval of the 2nd Punic War caused a complete restructuring of the Roman coinage and the quadrigatus was discontinued in favor of a new denomination, the denarius.

Roman Republic Silver Victoranius

Roman Republic / Silver Victoranius / after 211 BC. This coin was much lighter than a denarius and probably made to facilitate trade with the Greek cities to the south. Rome's influence expanded greatly following the 2^nd Punic War and the victoranius was discontinued.

Admittedly, the half dimes produced by the United States from 1794 through 1873 are not the most popular series in numismatics, but they are quite collectable. I will look at just two of the possible collections that can be formed by most collectors of average financial means within a reasonable period of time.

You will notice that I am not going to discuss assembling a type set. Building a type set is a fairly obvious mode of collecting our first five cent coins, so we will leave that option on the shelf for today while we look at two somewhat less obvious alternatives. Besides, when I started collecting in the mid 1970's, complete sets were all the rage so I still tend to focus on the goal of building complete sets.

With all that in mind, the first set that we will look at is the capped bust half dimes minted from 1829 through 1837. Because all of the coins in this series were minted at the Philadelphia mint, the complete set will consist of nine pieces assuming that varieties are not included. While these coins are not exactly rare, they make a fascinating and eye catching display now that all of them are over 160 years old.

As for assembling the set, Very Fine seems to be about an ideal condition. In this state of preservation the coins should show an abundance of hair detail on the obverse design along with plenty of feather detail remaining in the eagle on the reverse. What will a set like this cost? According to Coin World's Trends, it would run about $495 total for the nine pieces.

If you really like this series and you happen to have abundant financial resources, you may even consider assembling this set in BU condition. This is not as outrageous as it sounds; the total trends for the set is around $2550 in MS-60 and $5050 in MS-63. That is a lot of money, but when was the last time that you saw something like that? Besides, you would earn substantial bragging rights with the ability to say that you have completed a 160+ year old series in Brilliant Uncirculated Condition!

The second alternative set for collectors to consider is a complete one a year set of Seated Liberty half dimes. By collecting only one issue from each year that the seated liberty design was produced from 1837 to 1873, the budget minded collector will be able to form an impressive set of these coins.

The seated liberty half dimes were produced at one or more mints during the years 1837 through 1873 meaning that the one a year set will consist of 37 pieces totally and show each of the five design variations that occurred.

Once again, I suggest a grade of Very Fine as this grade will show most of the design details at a somewhat reasonable price. A look at Coin World's Trends shows that the only stumbling block to completing this set is the 1846. In 1846, half dimes were only produced at the Philadelphia Mint with a skimpy 27,000 minted, leading to a Trends value of $650 in VF. However, once this hurdle is crossed, the 1864-S is the only other issue in our one a year set with a three digit Trends value, and it is pegged at an even $100 in VF condition. Some quick number crunching with a calculator gives an estimated total Trends value of $1625 if the least expensive mint issue is selected for each of the 37 coins.

In the case of a one a year set it is not always best to choose the least expensive mint issue for every year. A little research will reveal that you can often acquire some of the much scarcer issues for only a minor increase in the cost. Take 1854 for example. In VF the 1854 has a Trends value of $15 and the 1854-O is valued at $20, a difference of only $5. However the 1854-O has only 1/4 the mintage. While original mintages are not an exact barometer of scarcity, they can at least give you a general idea.

One additional advantage of the one a year set is that it is an excellent starting point towards building the complete date and mintmark set. In fact, with the one a year set done, you will be more than half way done with the date and mintmark set. Best of all, you will already own the 1846 issue which is the key date to the entire seated liberty half dime series.

Have fun assembling your half dime set. Keep in mind that you are building a set of coins in an obsolete denomination that few people have ever heard of. Also notice as you go along that you are purchasing several coins with a lower mintage than the famous 1909-S VDB cent.... for only one tenth the price!

Archeological excavations from Babylon to Spain and from Gaul to Egypt have shown that about 450 BC coins from Athens, Greece were circulating around the entire ancient western world. The first single coinage to be so widely accepted.

Roman coins started with a profusion of images from Gods to moneyers to generals. Then Octavian took over, changed his name to Augustus and put his image on all the coins of the empire. That way the people would know to whom they were paying taxes. From then on Roman coins had images of the Caesar in power.

After the fall of Rome time was not wasted on fancy coins and the crude follis was circulated. The Christian Byzantines did not place much importance on earthly goods such as money. So while they built beautiful churches, they made simple coins.

Throughout medieval times people of the western world were known to be poor. This is evident in their thin, low grade coins. Meanwhile China was circulating cast bronze coins inscribed with the leaders name. This gives us an unbroken list of Chinese leaders for the past 2000 years.

Christians during crusades to expel the non-Christians from the holy lands came across ancient Greek and Roman knowledge in storage among Arabs. It was hundreds of years before it was understood and put to use but eventually coins contained high quality art and the Renaissance was under way.

The Renaissance led to the discovery of the "new world" and all it's riches. At first no time was wasted making beautiful numismatic masterpieces, the silver and gold was measured, struck and sent back to Europe. Eventually milled coins appeared with two images of a round earth.

The gold rush in California in 1849 and the Yukon in 1898 led to gold coins being struck both as souvenirs and currency. Abundant silver was found near Carson City, Nevada. The U.S. government gained control of it and set up a mint. Coins struck at Carson City have a CC mint mark.

The standing liberty quarter began circulation in 1916 with miss Liberty bare chested on the obverse . The next year she was changed to wearing steel mail. The official reason from the cost of the change was that the coins did not stack well (she looked well stacked to me).

Hobo nickels recall the great depression when a man would recarve a nickel so he could sell (or trade) it for more than a nickel just so he could survive. The silver nickel and steel cent during the second world war showed the need for nickel and copper in the U.S. war effort.

Today public and private mints produce coins to celebrate past and present events.

Key coins illustrating these points in history will be on display on the third floor of the Loussac Library April 27^th until May 1^st.