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Kind of boring CSNS Review

Hello All,

So I did end up attending CSNS on Saturday 4/26 with my daughter, Mom and Stepdad. We had a rock and mineral identification class in the morning nearby at the Lizzadro Museum of Lapidary Art (small, but great collection) so I "mentioned" that the show was only 15 minutes away (really, thirty) and we should go since we were that far out from our area as it was.

Well, everyone was enthusiastic about the idea since it was only noon. After we registered, I told my daughter to find the YN booth because "sometimes you can get free coins and things." Well CS was running a treasure hunt for all of the kids as it turns out. They got an answer sheet and had to travel all over the bourse floor to find dealers that had treasure maps attached to their booth signs. When they found a dealer with a map and who was not busy with an adult customer, they would ask the dealer for the question and have to answer it right. If they answered it right the dealer would have them circle the correct answer on their answer sheet, initial it and give them a free coin related to the question. Parents were encouraged to help and make sure that the kids got all of the answers right. Fiona was a little mad because she gets nervous around strangers and so clammed up and then second guessed herself on the first question or two. When I gave her a little calming down talking to to reassure her that this was all in fun and not a "pressure/competition" occasion of any sort, she loosened up and started to have fun. All of the dealers involved were pretty nice and Fi got some neat coins.

When she completed her 14 or 16 questions, she had to take it back to the YN booth to drop it off for entry into the raffle. Well, as it turns out the raffle was not until 3. I noticed at this point that my stepdad was noticeably absent for a while. Mom said he was looking at buying something with a few dealers. So I took Fiona around and we looked for foreign coins in the sea of US material. We found a dealer "Chief Coin and Supply Company" out of Oshkosh, WI who had a pretty nice selection of low to mid range foreign plus some junk boxes of notes, tokens and more modern foreign on the table. So Fiona poked around and I looked through the Russian. There was not much in Russian, but I did find some nice Farthings. The dealer gave me a break on a group of three (1874-H, 1879 and 1880) and I was off.

Mom and Fi were coined out so they went to wander so I could do my own looking. I went to see Jon Kern and the man at his table said that Jon had left and took all of his Roman with him except for what was in the case. Case stuff was mostly priced too high and without Jon there, I was not going to try and bargain. So twice in two weeks I missed Jon at a show. Disappointing because he was one dealer that I looked forward to buy from and mainly the only foreign/ancient dealer I knew would be there.

I did end up wandering around and doing some comparison shopping on US Large Cents which hold my fancy as big old hunks of copper. After some pricing runs back and forth I was able to get a nice 1828 and a nice 1831 at a discount. When I arrived home and looked at my Large Cent collection and I did not have those dates already I was very proud of myself for remembering after not working on them for about seven years.

As usual, I received most of my discounts of 10-25% because dealers were bailing out left and right from the bourse floor. Jerry from IA who I purchased the 1828 from flatly said, "Well, I don't want to be the last to leave and I would prefer to leave with a large group during the daytime." Many tables were empty and many more were in the process of being emptied. It worked to my advantage as I got a few deals, saving me probably $30. I swung back by the dealer with the Farthings and he gave me another nice price on four more strong F-VF farthings (1861 x 2 [couldn't decide, too cheap to worry about], 1885 and 1900).

It was finally quarter to three and so we headed back to the booth to YN booth for the drawings. At this point I finally caught up with my stepdad who had bought a '27 St. Gaudens. We hung out at the YN booth, designing coins and Fiona ended up winning a 1970 1 Tala from Pope Paul VI's visit to Western Samoa in the raffle! She was psyched to say the least.

Overall a fun short show, just with the usual lack of foreign and dealers bailing early on Saturday (which was the last day in this case). But we had fun, so good times.

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