A salute to Alan Weinberg of California

oreville

I brought an old Bert D. Richards & Co. Indian Trading Post of Manuelito, New Mexico - Aluminum $1.00 - In - Trade (item nm781b in the 2009 Edition of New Mexico Trade Tokens) to the Baltimore show.

I had purchased it on ebay in 1999 or 2000 and it is the only Indian trading token I own. I way overpaid for it back then at close to $800 as it was quite rare and I got into a bidding war and wanted this piece very badly at the time as I was really into anything that had to do with Manuelito.

I ended up showing it to Alan Weinberg who immediately went to work on giving me information on this piece eve though I told him it was not for sale.

Oddly enough, the old and new price guide of such piece was showing $800 because Alan found out that the author tracked down that the sale took place of almost $800. He was surprised that such piece was worth that much. He then later proceeded to make multiple offers exceeding what I paid. I reminded him that I was not quite through with enjoying it yet. He was very nice about it.

I knew it was quite rare. I was astonished to find that it was rated an R-10 rarity, meaning, 1 to 2 known.

Alan, while making multiple offers on this piece has been kind enough to supply me with more and more information about this and other trade tokens in general that I just wanted to make a public thank you to him!

MrEureka

To check out some of Alan's treasures, go to http://www.neocollect.com/, register, and poke around the "Public Collections". Alan has some incredible things.

BTW, you may be able to access his collections more easily here, possibly without registering.

Dentuck

A true enthusiast and a gentleman. Mr. Weinberg is always very generous with his knowledge and sharing his collections for the public good. Several of his medals, tokens, etc., are featured in Abraham Lincoln: The Image of His Greatness, the Guide Book of United States Tokens and Medals, and other Whitman Publishing books.

DUIGUY

WOWZERS!

Thanks for the link!

oreville

Andy:

Simply stunning!

jonathanb

The only "problem" with pointing people to Alan's site on NeoCollect is that it needs a little bit of context to fully appreciate the collection.

Anyone can look at those medals and say, "Gee, those are neat." They're more than neat. In many cases they're jaw-dropping.

The Ford collection may have had more breadth, but it had FAR less depth. I've been tracking auction appearances of US Mint medals and non-Mint award medals. In the last 5 years, Stack's has sold a total of 35 gold medals in those categories *including* all of the Ford sales and several resales of the same medal. Alan has at least as many already posted, and they're all spectacular, many of them one-of-a-kind. There are no "medalettes" here (although I imagine he has plenty of them stashed away).

And don't start me on the silver pieces!

If anyone is remotely interested in this sort of thing, be sure to take time to read this site *slowly*. It will be well worth it.

cladking

He has a sterling reputation.

Token pricing can be very ephemeral. I have the only known token from
Eaton Rapids, Michigan and haven't gotten a realistic offer for it. There's
a tendency for buyers to fear that a large hoard has been found and they
don't want to be the first to pay big bucks for a common token. The market
for these is very dynamic but very shallow. Ten of something can make it
humdrum and a hundred; common.

Many people don't realize that it's likely that 90% of the various tokens is-
sued over the last 150 years have no surviving examples and many of the
rest are fairly common (250-800). It makes prices about demand moreso
than supply and collectors tend to be very avid.

topstuf

I just got my copy of Heritage's Intelligent Collector and they featured Alan Weinberg.
I never heard of him but it appears he is selling some stuff and it will be the first time the coins have been graded.

He collected early and historic coins and from the article, it looks like the coins were very important ones.

This might be exciting.

BlindedByEgo

Sad that neocollect is no longer in operation. Thanks for the update, @topstuf

topstuf

I was gonna start a thread after reading my magazine and found our forum under the Googling of his name.

Soooo.... I just bumped the Google thread.

philographer

@oreville said:
...I was not quite through with enjoying it yet....

>

Seems to me that this is what collecting is all about

RogerB

He has been very generous with materials and information relating to several research projects. That is both unusual and very much appreciated.

oreville

Almost 10 years later and the only thing I believe has changed is Alan Weinberg of Florida (if I am not mistaken) ?
LOL

Zoins

Well, he sold this one at FUN this year. I bid but didn't win. I loved his commentary.

https://forums.collectors.com/discussion/1012181/1792-dickeson-restrike-cent-token#latest

Alan Weinberg's Commentary: The fascinating "1792" Dickeson patterns were apparently struck in two batches at separate times in 1859 or 1860. This is one of the few Prooflike specimens known with almost "watery" fields and considerable original color. Most often this beautiful coin is found with non-reflective, satiny, dark brown surfaces. I did feel this "pattern" was so aesthetically pleasing and attractive that it belonged in a 1792 U.S. pattern collection, as did Woodin, Pollock and the three authors of the new 1792 coinage reference.

SSR

An important example why ebay sales should not be cited on coinfacts

Zoins

@SSR said:
An important example why ebay sales should not be cited on coinfacts

If you are referring to the trial piece I posted, I only see Heritage prices, not eBay prices?

johnny9434

id like to see a pic or two of that one. cool story as well

oreville

saving from archives... to join the sister thread

not this thread began in 2009!