The PAN show is this weekend in Pittsburgh.

mdwoods · October 21, 2003 2:11AM

Who's is going? Here are some directions I found on the web. The show runs Friday-Sunday. According to CoinWorld there will be over 140 tables, admission is free. It should be a great show. I'll be there Friday and Saturday.

Pennsylvania Association of Numismatists
Coin Show Directions

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Greater
Pittsburgh
Expomart Radisson
Hotel
Pittsburgh
(412) 856-8100 (412) 373-7300

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76):
Take the Pennsylvania Turnpike (I-76) to Exit 6 (Monroeville)
Take the ramp for Business Rt. 22 West
Continue West past several shopping centers, restaurants and businesses (several traffic lights, about 2 miles)
Follow signs for Monroeville Mall, using EITHER:
Truck Entry (turning left at light)
Main Entry (bearing right and crossing over Rt. 22
The Expo Mart is the long, black building at the end of the mall parking lot, near Rt. 22.
Parking is FREE

From Downtown Pittsburgh Via The Parkway East (I-376):

Take the Parkway East (I-376) to Exit 14 (Business Route 22)
Continue east about 2 miles (about 3 traffic signals)
Turn right onto drive marked Monroeville Mall and Radisson Hotel

telecoin · October 21, 2003 2:29AM

I'll be there Friday. It's the best show in the area...I never miss it! Maybe I'll see you there Mark.

kranky · October 21, 2003 2:48AM

I'll be at Pat Vetter's table Friday and Saturday so please stop by and say hello. Pat has a corner table about 2/3 of the way down the aisle that's in front of you as you enter.

keets and I are having a showdown of 1912 Matte proof Lincolns.

keets · October 21, 2003 3:05AM

hey Jim

that's the kind of a showdown where there can be no loser!!!

..........BTW, kranky is in charge of entertainment on this short weekend. after Baltimore, he's suggested we avoid seafood and opt for a Friday evening at "OutBack" with steak as the main fare. perhaps we can round up a few stragglers-------Jamie!!-------and make a night of it. Md has some ideas!!

what is anyone else bringing for show and tell?? i've made a plan to meet njcoincrank to talk commems and let him take a gander at my c'stamped Clevelands and i know Mark will have some goodies.

al h.

mdwoods · October 21, 2003 3:12AM

I can't wait to see the matte proof Lincolns. Jamie, I'm sure we will cross paths.

If anyone wants to join us at
the Outback, please say so. You are more than welcome. The more the merrier.

quarterjack · October 21, 2003 3:13AM

Kranky, you'll have a hard time beating Keets' 1912 Matte, it's a beauty!
I may be there Sat. afternoon, not for sure as of yet.
Let me know the outcome.

Dave

njcoincrank · October 21, 2003 10:43AM

While I have no open dates for dinner, perhaps you should check out "The Wooden Nickel" for dinner. Very good. I eat there during every PAN show at least once.

Look forward to meeting some of you there. I promise I will try to be sociable.

njcoincrank

Bear · October 21, 2003 10:58AM

Sorry I cant join you fellas. But when you take that first bite of a great steak,

say "This ones for the Bear".

njcoincrank · October 21, 2003 11:02AM

Bear,

While I am known as njcoincrank on these boards, my alter-ego is

Grill Master B and his mobile Chuckwagon.

Beef, it's whats for dinnner.

njcoincrank

PTVETTER · October 21, 2003 12:04PM

Kranky,
My two tables have been a little closer to the front, after all these years I get moved.

RYK · October 21, 2003 12:20PM

I am an ex-Pittsburgher who is going to be in town to visit family and watch the Steelers play. I hope to work in a trip to the show on Friday morning.

Robert

vam44 · October 21, 2003 12:21PM

Hmmmm,

maybe I`ll show up there sometime this weekend.

mdwoods · October 23, 2003 2:06AM

I'm leaving my house about 5 am tomorrow. Should be about a 6 hour drive. Hope to see a bunch of forum members there.

PTVETTER · October 23, 2003 3:15AM

I have some of the new $20.00 bill if you haven't seen them in person yet stop by my table

Pat & BJ coin
may be listed as vetter coins also

bring money and buy ha ha ha

hope to see you all there

newtocoins · October 23, 2003 4:09AM

I will be attending. It is my first coin show in years. How do I find you all?

mdwoods · October 23, 2003 4:31AM

I will be attending. It is my first coin show in years. How do I find you all?

I would suggest going to this table first and asking about forum members. It sounds like the unofficial spot to meet.

Pat & BJ coin
may be listed as vetter coins also

keets · October 23, 2003 5:19AM

hey Mark

you beat me to a rendezvous spot!!! i think we should plan to gather at ptvetters table some time around 2 PM. that way, if there's any bashful members, they can lurk in the aisle and check out who's there before committing to the bedlam!!!

maybe with a large group we can assure that Pat gives us all the forum discount on first-day-of-show-purchases and we can test knanky's nerve as we crowd the table he's attending. Anna is really anxious for this trip: she's never been to Pittsburgh!!

..............an aside to njcoincrank----i'm off to the bank to get the Cleveland's and i hope you'll bring along your coin in the notarized holder, i believe it's number 137?? what a cool coin!!

al h.

mdwoods · October 23, 2003 5:59AM

That sounds good Keets. If anyone is interested, we will have an informal forum meeting at ptvetters table some time around 2 PM Friday, that's tomorrow.
I look forward to meeting old and new friends. mdwoods

kranky · October 23, 2003 11:29AM

Met Ira Stein tonight during dealer setup. When he stopped by Pat's table I asked him if he was Ira and said I recognized him from his "famous photo" on the PCGS message board. He knew exactly what I meant.

goose3 · October 23, 2003 11:31AM

Woods if you were going on Sunday I'd let you pick me up along the way!

Well I'm only about 50 miles out of the way.

PTVETTER · October 23, 2003 12:21PM

My wife (Betty Jean) and I will be looking forward to seeing everyone .
Don't forget all that cash you need to get rid of

Tootawl · October 23, 2003 12:49PM

Sorry I won't be able to meet you guys this time. I'm coming down with a cold, black plague, or something. Since I may not go to work, I don't think I'll be able to drive to PIttsburgh.

Whose turn is it to watch Woodie to make sure that he stays out of trouble?

keets · October 23, 2003 1:06PM

hey TooTawl

i'll be watching mark, but i can't gaurantee that he'll stay out of trouble. perhaps i can have an interesting report of his antics instead. he's bringing along his laptop and i need to take my password to log-on for a show report------LIVE from Monroeville!!!

al h.

mdwoods · October 23, 2003 6:37PM

It's 4:30 am. I'm getting ready to head out for the coin show. I'll meet Keets around 8:30 or 9 and then to Pittsburgh. Should get there before noon. How to
see you there. Mark

keets · October 23, 2003 9:17PM

holy smokes-------Mark's on the road and it's after 7. i guess i better quit goofing around here and get packed!!

hope to see whoever shows up and have a few laughs, see some nice coins.

al h.

mdwoods · October 24, 2003 10:51AM

Keets and I got to the show about 1:00 or so. The crowd wasn't real heavy, but there were still quite a few people there. We headed for PTVETTERs table and met him and Kranky was there helping him out. I picked a beautiful toned 1941 WLH and also an 1881 S Morgan that had some nice color to it. We spent a good amount of time talking and looking at coins Kranky and Keets both had their nice matte proof Lincolns and other goodies to look at. There were quite a few tables set up. Lots of raw coins and quite a bit of slabbed stuff also. Slabbed Morgans were in abundance. Roma coins had lots of nice stuff out. We stopped by njcoincranks table and he had some very nice and very rare stuff, including a PCGS MS65 Spanish Milled dollar. Still had luster showing throught the patina. He also had some wonderful civil war tokens. I found one nice medal with some trees on it.

After the show ended for the evening, Kranky treated Keets and I to a very, very nice dinner at the Wooden Nickel restaurant. We had a great time eating and talking coins. It was a very enjoyable day. Wish you all could have been here. Mark

PTVETTER · October 24, 2003 10:56AM

It was my pleasure meeting everyone and hope all enjoyed themselves

keets · October 24, 2003 11:39AM

seems to me that the crowd was a little sparse for the opening day, but i'm prayin' for a rainy Saturday to bring out the collectors!!! shows just feel better to me when the crowds are bigger, the aisles more crowded and all that movement and noise gets oing full tilt. there were plenty of dealers set up with quite a variety of coins, raw-slabbed-classic-modern-mint products-ancients-foreign-medals, you name it. i'll admit to being somewhat road weary from a late Thursday night and the short trip, so all i bought was a few books--------Breen/Swiatek on commems and a 2nd edition "Jefferson Nickel Analyst" which should surprise noone!!

we have plans to hit the Krispy Kreme donut shop in the morning to get all charged up for Saturday!! i have high hopes of finding a nice half-cent or 3CN for my denomination set and plan on putting in some chair time looking at Jeffersons and letting njcoincrank bend my ear about commems or whatever.

anyone else planning on coming out to the show? the mood on the floor and at the tables was extremely positive today. hope to see you there. bring something for us to oogle at!!

al h.

golddustin · October 24, 2003 12:54PM

I will be going to the Pitt game Sat @ noon....an easy trip out the parkway to Expomart!! I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible Sat afternoon/evening.

keets · October 25, 2003 12:24PM

...............P.A.N. Show, day two.

we started out with a trip to Krispy Kreme complete with some "BOLD" coffee and two dozen doughnuts. first stop was "the table" where we checked in with Pat-and-company and started our walk. i had a couple of coins i hoped to sell to be able to afford a nice half-cent, a draped bust if i can find one. i let kranky talk me out of the two that were talking to me!! there's an 1800 in a PCGS VF that i'll talk to the dealer about tomorrow. we had a chance to talk with Bill, alias njcoincrank, and he gave good insightful answers to some questions and caused me to think in another direction about other stuff!!

we met up with quarterjack around lunchtime and he gave us a look at some really nice gold dollars and some early 50's proofs. after a quick break me and mdwoods each connected with a dealer for some nice commems. mine's an NGC Iowa MS66 with great luster and faint rose tone throughout. overall it looks better than most of thre brilliant counterparts that i saw without overpowering.

speaking of commems, they seem to be literally coming out of the woodwork. nearly every dealer has them in his case. while there were no monster toned coins that i saw, the mere fact that a wide choice of grade/type made it somewhat easy to be picky. the days biggest disappointment was when i discovered that one of the dealers had packed up and gone home---------they had a two-cent pc. that i hoped to buy. what happened is that i sold the one i had at a loss, a PCGS MS65BN, to buy a PCGS MS63BN that had some very nice blueish tone on both sides, kind of an upgrade through downgrading!! so now i have money for tomorrow, so alls well that ends well, i hope.

we rounded out the day with a trip to Outback with me, mdwoods and kranky enjoying a good meal and some hearty laughs!! me and Mark are all coffeed up, who's gonna be on this evening?? tomorrow we'll hit the floor for a few hours before the trip home. man, i sure hope that woman of mine remembered to visit my cats!! they get really worked up when they're left alone for too long.

al h.

PTVETTER · October 25, 2003 12:35PM

It never seems to fail, everyone comes at the same time. I had to quickly go thru over 300 silver dollars and try to make a deal. win soe and them like this loose some (money that is). The moral is take your time whe doing a deal. My wife and I will be looking forward forward to seeing everyone tomorrow.

FC57Coins · October 25, 2003 12:37PM

Good report guys - Al - how did you make sure Mark took ALL his medications??

keets · October 25, 2003 12:46PM

hey Frank

Mark took everything right on schedule. the only problem was convincing him that Carol wouldn't be at the show so there would be no need to wear that darn thong!!!

al h.

njcoincrank · October 26, 2003 12:39AM

Got back from Pittsburgh last night. Had a fairly good show.

The highlight was seeing Kranky again, along with meeting Keets and MDWoods.

Oh yeah, bought a few really cool coins, and sold numerous others.

njcoincrank

keets · October 26, 2003 8:46AM

Show wrap up................mdwoods dropped me off about an hour ago and after he filled up his thermos for the trip, off he went. we had a very good weekend and really enjoyed the extra hour of sleep last night!!! we got to the show with the intention of making one trip around the floorand leaving by noon but that didn't work out----we exited around 2:30. i had a chance to talk to a copper guy about some half cents that i couldn't afford to buy!! oh well, maybe i better save my pennies for the next show. i'm stuck on those early 1800's issues and i figure i'm better off spending more for a coin i really like than upgrading somewhere down the road. looking at old copper was sure an education for me. can anybody say "in over your head"??

we stopped at the book guys table and talked with him for awhile before each getting a new copy of The Complete Guide To Buffalo Nickels. if nothing else, i picked up some good reference material at this show. i also gave in and bought an NGC PF69UCAM 1972 Jefferson that should cross easily at PCGS. it's one of the last coins i need for my set and i haven't been able to find a raw coin that would make the grade. one dealer had a nice Isabella Quarter that i liked, price and all, but there was a bit of rub on the reverse that scared me away. overall, the attendance at the show seemed sparse to me, never really picking up the pitch after the crowd peaked at noon each day. who else attended and chose to remain anonymous?? let us know what you thought.

next up is the Michigan State show. Mark has invited me up the weekend after Thanksgiving and it seems a good alternative for me to the following weekend's Baltimore show----closer and i won't have to take any vacation time. but i gotta save up for that half cent................

al h.

PTVETTER · October 26, 2003 9:18AM

I'm thinking about going up to Mich state the day after thanksgiving. I know its a long day but I leave Pittsburgh in the early AM and return late that same evening. I may see all of you up there then,
Next show for me is the Fairview park show at the VFW Cleveland area. that's next Sunday

kranky · October 26, 2003 10:03AM

I want to thank PTVETTER for letting me be in his way on Friday and Saturday

. Normally I get to sell a decent number of proof sets which is easy as the prices are established. This time, I only sold one.

You know why you ought to attend coin shows? In just two days, I got to see the following:

A fake 1909-S VDB where the mintmark was chased (metal is scraped out of the field leaving the shape of the mintmark behind)

A fake 1909-S Indian cent where the mintmark was added. Even knowing it was fake, and examining it with a 16x loupe, I absolutely could not tell. The mintmark was the right shape, the right position, was the exact same color as the rest of the coin, and I couldn't see a seam even though I already knew it was there.

An unbelievable set of Assay commission medals

A collection of contemporary counterfeit bust halves

A half-dozen off-center Morgan dollars I also got a great education about proof Buffalos, learning how to see haze and dip residue. Both examples were in top-tier slabs, by the way. Also got some insight on how to identify fake gold.

I learned a ton in just two days. Getting to see known fake coins is extremely valuable. I must say again, that bogus 1909-S Indian shocked me. After seeing that one, I have a new respect for how good these people are getting. The slabbing service picked it up with a 60x microscope.

Saw quite a few people (vest pocket dealers, mostly) looking to sell coins and they had a combination of slabs and raw coins. Funny thing was, the raw coins tended to be gold. It would really make me suspicious.

It was nice of keets and mdwoods and quarterjack to make the journey to Pittsburgh for the show.

Oh, I think keets' 1912 Matte proof Lincoln was nicer than mine. It's a beauty.

golddustin · October 26, 2003 11:33AM

Well, the weekend didn't work out quite like I planned, and I had to rush into the show Sunday morning, leave at noon to deliver my daughter to a soccer banquet, then rush to get back at 2:20..needless to say, I really didn't get to see too much, nor meet anybody from the forum. I kept asking the dealers I talked to if they posted on the clct club forum, but nobody admitted to it! I wish I had had the chance to see some of that educational material...sounds very enlightening. I did manage to swing a trade of some Buffaloes (which I've decided to liquidate) for a couple of lightly cleaned commems (a Pan-Pac and Hawaii). I also talked to the book fella, and asked him to keep me in mind if he came across any early copper reference books - turns out he's local also, so i may just visit him another time to look over all those books - can always learn somethin'! I need to get to more shows - I was like a kid in a candy shop - so much to look at, so little time! Plus I could gain a little experience in the fine art of negotiation - the dealers ALWAYS (of course) want to know what you're expecting to get for a coin - I always play dumb, stutter, mumble, try to wait for them to throw out a number. I guess some work of grey sheet minus, some work just grey sheet, and for some it just depends on what's hot at the time. Personally, I think it's time to get back to commems - the rest of the market has been moving up, but they seem to be stuck in an extended rut - can't last forever, can it? (One thing I did notice is that an awful lot of commems seem to have been cleaned to some extent, although I did see some with very nice toning). Sorry I didn't meet any of you...I'll make a better effort next time.

keets · October 26, 2003 11:53AM

hey Golddustin

while i saw a wide variety of coins at the show, the ones that really stuck in my mind were commems. Saturday we found a raw Hugeunot with lovely frosted surfaces but a few too many field marks to warrant the price. then today, we came across what looked like a Proof 1892 Columbian. the dealer had it in a 2X2 and marked Proof Cameo. it looked proof to me, but others say it most likely is just an early strike, perhaps shortly after the actual Proofs were struck. as we were leaving we came across o killer toned Oregon trail in a PCGS MS66, a raw San Diego with a scintillating obverse but a light staple scratch on the reverse

and a raw Sesqui with 64/65 surfaces and and tone that was magnificent. i think if the Sesqui gets bought/holdered/pictured somewhere i'll recognize it. a truly beatiful coin with a "too high for me" price tag.

al h.

golddustin · October 26, 2003 12:01PM

I'm pretty sure I saw the Proof Columbian, but I'm positive I saw that Oregon Trail....it just kinda grabbed my attention from among all the coins in the case! Toning was indeed magnificent. I was gonna ask the price, but the table was awfully busy when I went by - I meant to stop back, but you already know the rest of the story!

The PAN show is this weekend in Pittsburgh.

Comments

Leave a Comment