Nerosmyfavorite68 Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 Collecting gold was way better during the '90's. The Catch-22; I didn't have a lot of money, being in HS/college. I have fond memory of going to the college library and finding Allen Berman's listings in the Celator. A world-famous Byzantine expert worked at that library, so it was chock-full of numismatic literature. 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nerosmyfavorite68 Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 Also, a coin show around 2002/2003: I may be conflating two different years, but Jon Kern had both a bag full of Honorius era solidi for $500, and a bag full of posthumous Lysimachus Tet's (gorgeous) for various prices. I got a really nice tet with a minor ding, for around $250/275. During the mid-to-late 1990's, my grandfather and I would go to Chicago during the summer. I would drag him to both Jon Subak and HJB. We had the most delightful carrots-in-rum, at the Miller's Pub, and we'd stay at the Blackhawk Hotel. There was also a place with delightful frozen lemonade, next to an artsy theater. One year, there was a coin show at the pier, and I remember going to Allen Berman's booth. I think that was the year where I was awed by the awesome tray of 1st century Sestertii one dealer had. I'll never forget the beautiful Postumus Double Sestertius that Jon Kern had, jet black and $400. That was the era when HJB had two or three tiers of pick bins. I can't remember his name, but there was kind of a gruff, curly-haired guy there. I still vividly remember the contents of the bin. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seth77 Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 (edited) On 5/22/2023 at 9:39 PM, Heliodromus said: I've been collecting for almost exactly 20 years. To me those early years were the golden days compared to today both in terms of supply and community - tons of finders selling good quality coins on eBay, as well as dealers such as a few fondly remembered names such as AAH (Ancient Auction House) and Slavey (Slavey Petrov the forger I believe!), etc. In those early days there were still lots of dealers with their own web sites, before they all migrated to VCoins. Bargains and rarities to be had if you could hunt them down. FORVM was super active back then with Barry Murphy and Curtis Clay both posting and helping regularly, plus there was ancients.info where Zach Beasley (Beast Coins) would usually be seen, and the Moneta-L list was still frequented by collectors as well as dealers. Of course it was easier to find things of interest when you are starting out, but the supply really was very different than today. I remember on one day receiving coins in the mail from 6 different countries! There were lots of foreign sellers back then who would either not speak english and/or not accept PayPal, so buying coins often entailed sending off a fistful of Euros obtained from the bank, or a Western Union transfer on occasion. I often had to communicate by email using Google translate, which was pretty poor back then (but still a game changer and amazing to have)... Due to the poor quality translation my process was to translate to target language, then back into English to see if it was still intelligible, and if not simplify and iterate! jdholds (Jerome Holderman) from Forvm was probably the first person I ever bought an oversea coin from. And then or possibly simultaneously, there was Kevin Sands (Mayadigger on Forvm) who also had a commercial site in the early 2000s where he usually sold uncleaned coins. I would buy an assortment of a few coins from his green, cruddy, orange and 'Balkan' categories and he always used to add extra coins. I also remember the big controversy surrounding 'monneron' and his 'hoard' of Constantinian AE3s that where heavily dissected online and either condemned as fakes or accepted by others as very nice authentic coins. I also remember that back then a good siliqua was 50$ and lots of British siliquae clipped could be had for 20-30£ and shipping with Registered Royal Mail was probably the fastest in Europe, even faster than Deutsche Post. Edited March 23 by seth77 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heliodromus Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 5 hours ago, seth77 said: I also remember the big controversy surrounding 'monneron' and his 'hoard' of Constantin AE3s that where heavily dissected online and either condemned as fakes or accepted by others as very nice authentic coins. Haha -yes, I was the one who started that with my "Peculiar Patina" thread, which I think even today may be the most read thread on FORVM! Nowadays I accept that they are real (and kudos to Victor Clark who recognized that from the beginning). Too bad I didn't buy some of the nice ones! It's nice to hear names like Jerome and Kevin/Mayadigger - that was a great time to be collecting, and to be active on FORVM. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seth77 Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 2 hours ago, Heliodromus said: Haha -yes, I was the one who started that with my "Peculiar Patina" thread, which I think even today may be the most read thread on FORVM! Nowadays I accept that they are real (and kudos to Victor Clark who recognized that from the beginning). Too bad I didn't buy some of the nice ones! It's nice to hear names like Jerome and Kevin/Mayadigger - that was a great time to be collecting, and to be active on FORVM. I have been returning often, now that I am studying 'Greek Imperial' or 'provincials' to read 20 year old threads from Patricia Lawrence (slokind) and Jochen. Back then I was too young and immature to understand the precious knowledge and insights they were dropping. 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Benefactor DonnaML Posted March 23 · Benefactor Benefactor Share Posted March 23 1 hour ago, seth77 said: I have been returning often, now that I am studying 'Greek Imperial' or 'provincials' to read 20 year old threads from Patricia Lawrence (slokind) and Jochen. Back then I was too young and immature to understand the precious knowledge and insights they were dropping. I believe Jochen still posts on Forvm, and still was posting on Coin Talk as of a few years ago. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
seth77 Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 6 minutes ago, DonnaML said: I believe Jochen still posts on Forvm, and still was posting on Coin Talk as of a few years ago. Yes, he was still posting on CT every once in a while, some of my purchases were directly inspired by his "dear friends of ancient mythology" posts 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil Anthos Posted March 23 · Member Share Posted March 23 1 hour ago, seth77 said: I have been returning often, now that I am studying 'Greek Imperial' or 'provincials' to read 20 year old threads from Patricia Lawrence (slokind) and Jochen. Back then I was too young and immature to understand the precious knowledge and insights they were dropping. Those were great days at Forvm, and Pat was a real gem. There were many experienced and knowledgeable members back then. Unfortunately I have to dodge tumbleweeds there now. 🙁 ~ Peter 4 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JeandAcre Posted March 25 · Member Share Posted March 25 On 3/22/2024 at 8:13 PM, Bonshaw said: This prompted me to look in the library I inherited from my dad - I found these Alex Malloy catalogs: Medieval Coins I - XIII (13 volumes spanning 1970-1975) Alex Malloy XXXI May-June 1973 Catalogue XXXVIII September 1975 Medieval Coins Auction Sale IV March 14, 1975 Medieval Coins Auction Sale VII March 13, 1976 Should be fun reading. If you want me to look anything up, let me know. Nope, @Bonshaw, I'm going nowhere near asking you about selling any of them. Not touching that. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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