Show report:
Gettysburg is for the collector, not the "accumulator." Yes, there was bullion silver and gold if you wanted to buy it, but there weren't multiple tables wholly dedicated to it. The Reeded Edge and a couple others provided quality pieces worth your while if you wished to pay $5000 for a single coin, but the overwhelming bulk of the show was dedicated to the low- and mid-range collector. 100 tables, and only one or two were empty, probably due to unforseen situations on the part of the occupants.
It was a great place to be if your budget dictated $10 per coin.
Morgans were, of course, well-represented both slabbed and in bulk. What impressed me was the selection available raw, and in slabs at $100 or less.
Piles of raw Morgans.
The "usual" assortment of Type coins was to be had in great variety, although it was far easier to find post-Bust issues than Bust and earlier. My companion on the trip, who does
Half Dimes, had a field day.
There was a decent selection of Capped Bust Halves, but true "Early" stuff was not well represented, especially copper. Not that you couldn't find it, but you weren't going to be torn between half a dozen tables laden with pre-1830 pieces. There were actually few issue- or series-specific dealers; almost all were generalists with a wide variety of offerings. A Merc or Walker specialist would have undoubtedly found something nice to buy, but an SLQ person would not have had as good a time.
As a result, copper suffered since it tends to be offered by dedicated specialists. My main interest is copper, and although I had no trouble finding worthy Lincolns (one I brought home is in the "Post your toned coins" thread), one of my casual searches - low-end pre-1800 copper - came up pretty short.
It was a remarkably good show for World collectors. No doubt in my mind one could have assembled a pretty complete OFEC from what was in the room, for reasonable prices. Few slabbed - or slab-worthy - examples, though. Like I said, this was a show for the average collector. In the cases of many countries, offerings went
deep to the extent of boxes and albums full of possibilities. Places like Cyprus and French Indochina and the like; I wasn't really seeking it so I don't have the full list, but it was a disproportionate representation for a "medium" show.
Unfortunately for me, that description didn't include the Canadian Large Cents I primarily seek. I found only two Mint State examples in the room, aside a luscious complete album offering whose worst coin was XF, and one of those two came home with me. Canadian silver & nickel was pretty common, though.
Ancients were plentiful at the low end. I know too little about them to estimate the quality of the variety, except to observe that multiple dealers had 2x2 boxes full of Ancients tabbed by ruler/empire.
It doesn't get much better for an "everyman" collector than this show. Big enough to have variety, yet small enough to do in one day. Except, of course, if you're the type who likes to pore over filled buckets and 2x2 boxes; you'd
never have gone through them all in one long day.
Posted 09/10/2017 6:48 pm
