Red Riley

A real ooo err, hmmm this one. Interesting item on the Today programme yesterday. It appears that Joseph Boehm who designed the Jubilee head for the 1887 coinage died of a heart attack whilst on the job with Queen Victoria's daughter Princess Louise. She was quite a fair looking woman so there are worse ways to go. Perhaps he was engraving her bust...?

The Grading book linked by Tom is a splendid work. I picked it up a few months back, and it's highly useful! Thought I would wait for the heat to go out of this thread before I added my fourpennorth and this gives me a nice opportunity. Firstly, brg thanks for the kind words (for my sins, I wrote the grading book). Secondly, to all intents and purposes the book is now out of print, I have a few copies but they won't last for ever. I am toying with writing a revised edition but there are a few things to be sorted and this is at best some while away. As a small time dealer, I have had some involvement with buying and selling slabbed coins and for what it's worth I find that approximately half my UK customers ask me to remove the coin from the slab before sending it to them. The reason for this is not hard to see and revolves around the collector mentality in that we all like to line our coins up in one way or another and the odd slab just sticks out like a sore thumb. I have also failed to notice any great premium for slabbed coins in the UK where a substantial proportion of collectors are only vaguely aware of what a slab is and what it does. I think we can lose sight of the fact that as regular contributors to this board, coins are a way of life rather than a pleasant and undemanding pastime. Finally, my recollection of how the rainbow toning thing in America came about was that Jim Halperin noticed that a batch of Morgan dollars which had been in the shop window for some months were just showing the first signs of said rainbow colouring. I have to say though that when I have tried leaving coins on the window sill for an extended period, nothing happens. But then we don't get California strength sun here. Whatever, done this way it is going to be a long process and I wonder how many collectors have got the patience...?

They've only just sent me my advert proof. I know that they had a long term aim to split into two volumes but there has been no indication that this was to take place this year. Certainly I have not been asked in which volume I wanted my advert to go.

To check the metal, take a known 50% silver coin from your collection, hold it gently between thumb and forefinger and tap it with a pencil. Then take the 1933 crown and do the same. Do they sound the same? If all you get out of the crown is a dead thud then you've got a wrong 'un..

Damn, I was going to say that! A couple of years ago I had wrens and goldcrests nesting in the same tree in my garden. Difficult to judge which was the smaller...

The picture is a little blurred in places so not easy to tell much. A good starting point would be to weigh it. Should be 28.30g +/- 0.05g.

I wonder if there isn't perhaps a different aspect to this. We are basing our assessments on the auction houses of maybe 50 years ago, but I wonder if dealers' grades have actually changed that much. It would take a long memory to come up with a categorical answer but my recollections, hazy as they might be would indicate that retail grades aren't a lot different to those prevalent when I started collecting in the late sixties. Of course, few illustrated dealers' lists were produced then, so it is always going to be a matter of conjecture but I just have my suspicions that not a lot has changed.

As I understand it, made from a 1935 with the whole exergue lowered and the numbers recut. Incredibly skillful and probably worth the three figures (as long as those figures aren't too big) that you'll pay for it.

There has been talk over the years about Queen Victoria being born the wrong side of the blankets.

I know it's not meant to be taken seriously (or perhaps it is?) but that's one god-ugly coin. I've occasionally bought them as part of bulk lots but they're on e-bay the next day. I just can't stand to keep them with real coins!

Something I'm always afraid of when I do coin shows etc. Unfortunately it happens, I do remember of a small dealer a few years ago who had a large chunk of his stock stolen. Alarmingly and although nothing was proven, the word 'on the street' was that another dealer was the culprit.

That makes sense to me. I have had to return a number of lots over the years and have never had a problem getting my money back.

I seem to remember that being said in the Coin Yearbook maybe 40 years ago, but my hazy memory recalls it as being about EF. I have to say that I would be unhappy with a grading system that graded only the very best coins and left 95% of the available material to fight over the grades from Fine to Dreadful. Apart from anything else it would turn coin collecting into a rich persons' club to the detriment of the vast bulk of collectors.

I have to say, that for me the damage has already been done as I barely looked at their latest catalogue. Maybe I'll give them a year or so and see how they shape up.

It's absolutely pointless. As I explained. Most of the coins have a reserve but there is'nt enough people bidding to hit the reserve. When I emailed the seller of one coin 2 months ago, we'll lets just say I'm STILL awaiting his reply That of course is why E-Bay have a monopoly. It is virtually impossible to set an online auction site going without an existing customer base in the hundreds of millions. No sane seller would put any coin on a new site without a realistic reserve. On the other hand with E-Bay I could put an Edward VIII proof set on there for £0.99 and be reasonably confident of getting somewhere near the market price. I wish it weren't so but there it is, and I don't see the situation changing any time soon. To be honest though this site doesn't help itself by charging almost as much as E-Bay without being able to offer anything like the footfall or whatever the online equivalent is.

When standing in a hole it's best to stop digging. Not sure this is the emoticon I want but I hope it says 'embarrassment'!

Sticky matress = difficulty in rousing oneself in the mornings. Fortunately nothing whatever to do with newlyweds!

My appearances at the Midland have been a little sporadic of late what with daughter getting married and my anticipating sticky matress syndrome in advance! It's only a hundred and something miles away but it always feels a lot more in the ridiculously early hours of a Sunday morning... Might actually make the October fair if my run of recent declinatures hasn't blotted my copybook.

Germany is one of the biggest export markets for UK based coin dealers but you'd have to sell an inordinate amount of coins to make a trip there economically viable, unless you combine it with a holiday I suppose. On the other hand leaving £xxxk of stock in the boot for a couple of weeks is not for the faint-hearted. Think I'll stay home... I usually take a fair amount of cash at the Midland but when you take into account travelling, table fee, general buggeration it often ends up quite marginal. Some of the dealers I speak to who are regulars just use it as a flag waving exercise and forget about the economics, so I suppose I've been lucky.

Close, the Bonzo Dog Band and, as you say the inimitable Vivian Stanshall. The song (if you can call it that) is 'Rhinocratic Oaths'.

OK, so who's this; Soon after his second wife passed away Percy Rawlinson seemed to spend more and more time with his pet alsatian Al, His friends said 'you'll end up looking like a dog Percy, ha ha, He was later arrested near a lamp post. At his trial some months later he surprised everyone by mistaking a policeman for a postman And tearing his trousers off with his bare teeth, In his defence he said, 'It's hard to tell the difference when they take their hats off. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em.

Doh!!!

Yes - that's a better picture. I'd say it was GF from that obverse, but interestingly there's no cross stroke on the 'f' of 'f.d.' - I don't know if it's a variety or just wear? If just wear then it's worth around £25, possibly a shade more. I would actually go a little more than that, both in grade and value. NVF for me, based partly on my instinct that the reverse will almost certainly be better. Gothic florins are running some way ahead of book now, so I would say £40 although that isn't what a dealer would pay. 1872 is however the most common of the bunch.

I'm guessing that it's a planchet (blank) flaw. I have quite often come across bronze pennies with small pieces of metal flaking off and from my recollection this occurs throughout the production run. For some reason bronze seems to be quite prone to this.

If anybody wants to understand the concept of 'subject drift' they should read this thread!