I recently bought a pile of old Numismatic Scrapbook issues from 1959, and my, how times have changed.  Seems like the big thing back then were rolls, rolls, rolls. A lot of dealers were stocking, selling, and even buying, rolls of uncirculated coins. And by no means were these vintage rolls, but actually current coinage. Speculation was high thanks to the 1950-D nickel, and I guess everyone and their brother thought keeping a garage full of rolled coins around would be the equivalent of a 401k someday. We all know what happened to that bubble, don't we. But I was also shocked to find quite a few advertisements for coin cleaners as well. Seems everybody was okay with cleaning anything and everything in their collection. Thank goodness that trend came to an end. The good old days weren't always so good I guess. Now I  know why I see so many "improperly cleaned" NGC slabs around. The dealer ads in old issues are always interesting, but I almost cried when I came across one offering a small assortment of proof U.S. patterns from 1869 starting at $17.50! To top it off, the back cover featured an ad from B. Max Mehl.  I sure could use plans for a Time Machine right about now.....

After waiting nearly three weeks, the U.S. Mint has finally updated their bi-weekly sales figures, which included the final mintages of everything they minted in 2019. Of interest are the commemoratives,  bullion coins, and other special issues. It's no surprise that the Apollo 11  issues were big sellers. In fact, they were the mint's best selling commemoratives since the 2014 Baseball Hall of Fame coins. The American Legion issue proved to be a disappointment, however.  As an example, the Apollo 11 proof dollar saw a mintage of 218,9995 pieces, compared to only 18,811 for the American Legion proof dollar. The uncirculated Apollo 11 half dollar sold 41,742 coins, compared to a dismal 11,430 for the American Legion.  Goes to show what a beautiful design can do for sales, especially outside of the usual collector circles (meaning us). You can view this information at www.usmint.gov under "Cumulative Sales Figures." 

As a sidebar to my small but growing collection of U.S. colonial copper coins, I recently purchased a few evasion coppers.  Evasion coppers are counterfeit British halfpennies and pennies struck generally from 1760-1820. They were meant to deceive and circulated freely in England, Canada, and America. Evasion coppers are usually always underweight, so an inexpensive pocket scale comes in handy. Some were manufactured in England and were exported to America where there was a shortage of small change coinage. Other Evasion coppers were manufactured in Canada, and are known as Blacksmith Tokens.  American pieces were struck at Machin's Mills and these appear in the Red Book.  To help pass for real coinage, dies were typically left unfinished, thus giving the coins the appearance of being well circulated. (A well circulated coin did not arouse suspicion.) Other manufacturers made up their own obverse legends to technically avoid counterfeiting laws. A typical Evasion copper can be purchased for $15-20. All in all, these pieces make up an interesting part of colonial coinage. After all, it's not everyday you knowingly buy a counterfeit coin.  Interestingly enough, NGC certifies Machin's Mills  pieces, but apparently not other evasion coppers.