Broken Bank Notes Message Board

I have finished synthesizing the information I have received from the old Smythe and NASCA catalogues made available to me. The result can be seen in the All_Lots.xls file. The most recent edition has the following changes from previous versions:

1) Smaller file size due to removal of the broken hyperlinks to Smythe images
2) Additional column denoting Auction House (to allow sorting by auction house)
3) Sale date column now stored in computer sortable format (yyymmdd)
4) A notation was added to the Chain of Custody column when an item was noted as a plate note for a reference book.

The spreadsheet now contains 6661 rows of auction listings. In some cases single auction lots were broken into multiple rows (when the auction lot contained items from multiple banks).

The Sale Dates tab contains information about the auction catalgues that were processed (in black) as well as those that were referenced (in red).

Processing that is under way includes the following:

1) Cross-checking the chain of custody references. When a lot description references a prior auction that has been processed into the spreadsheet I verify that the lot descriptions match. When they do, I color code the chain of custody cells pale green and include a forward reference in the older lot's Chain of Custody cell so that the entries cross reference each other and can be seen as verified.

2) Inserting and verifying Haxby reference numbers for lots that previously had none. This generally involves putting the bank number in first, and verifying the note type number later. Cells are marked bright yellow if they are incomplete or need verification of some sort. Cells are marked red if verification is impossible for some reason (e.g. no information provided in catalgue that enables verification).

3) Including information from recent Stack's auctions.

4) Processing the information about the catalogues to produce a "shopping list" of catalogues I would like to scan, and seeking out those catalogues. I will post a list soon, but basically any catalogue shown in red on the Sale Dates tab is on my shopping list.

- Greg

I've updated the spreadsheet with all the lots I know about from the recorded Stack's actions (the ones still available on their web site). The new statistics look like this:

Total rows: 6942
AL: 91
AR: 4
CA: 2
CT: 472
DC: 193
DE: 36
FL: 39
GA: 238
HI: 2
IA: 11
IL: 264
IN: 132
KS: 1
KY: 125
LA: 86
MA: 531
MD: 265
ME: 195
MI: 97
MN: 33
MO: 77
MS: 130
NC: 42
NE: 11
NH: 42
NJ: 363
NY: 1178
OH: 329
PA: 1036
RI: 348
SC: 32
TN: 205
TX: 6
US: 5
VA: 111
VT: 112
WI: 95
Unknown: 2

Identification Information
Haxby:
Of these, 6352 have some form of Haxby number (most are complete, but many have just the bank number at this time, including those tagges as "unlisted types). 448 are shown as Unlisted banks in Haxby. Only 142 hae no Haxby reference information at all. One of the tasks I am involved in is making sure that ALL of the entries have something in that cell (even if only to denote that it is unlisted in Haxby).

Alternate:
990 rows currently have some form of alternate identification information, and some of them hav multiple types.

Auction House Representation
NASCA: 586
Smythe: 5937
Stack's: 419

At this point I believe I have captured and coded all the information available to me from all catalogues except the 1990 Christie's catalogue, which has already been summarized separately in the ObsoleteProofs file. I'm still toying with the idea of adding that data to the spreadsheet, but that would be a very long process for one person to undertake.

So for a while at least, I think I'll rest on my laurels and do some further analysis and cleanup of the data I have gathered.

- Greg

Here is the list of catalogues I am still seeking to scan into the database being produced. If you have any of these catalogues and would be willing to loan them to me, I would happily pay for postage in both directions and would return the catalogue(s) promptly.

CAA Catalogues:
May 1991
January 1992
January 1994
Jun 17-18 1994
January 1999
September 1999
September 2000 (Harris Collection)
September 2001 (Walter Jones Sale)
January 2003 (Pullen Sale)
May 1-3 2003 (CSNS Signature Sale)

Christie's
April 1981 (Vattemare Sale)
September 17 1982 (Robson Lowe/Christie's Alexander Vattemare Presentation Album's Sale Part Two)
March 1994 (Hon. J. W. Middendorf III Collection Sale)

Donlon's
1974 (Thomas F. Morris Sale)

Early American
December 9 2000
August 21 2001
December 2002

Lyn Knight
1992 Memphis Sale
1993 Memphis Sale
Glenn Martin Kentucky Collection Sale

NASCA
January 21-22 1977 (Guevrekian Sale)
January 1978 (New England Sale)
April 30 1979
November 1979 (Brookdale Sale)
December 1981 (Uhl Auction)
October 31 - November 2 1983 (Abner Reed Sale)
May 1984 (Sale #57, Lepczyk Sale)
November 1985
March 1986
November 1987
April 1989
June 1990
November 1991
March 1996
January 1997

R. M. Smythe
1986 Memphis Sale
1986 Stockton Sale
1990 Memphis Sale
December 1991
March 1992
April 1992
November 1992
1993 Memphis Sale
June 1993
March 1994
November 4-5 1994 (St. Louis Sale)
March 1996 (Chicago Paper Money Exchange Sale)
October 1997 (Sale #169)
June 16 2000 (Sale #199)
November 16 2001 (New York City Fall Sale)
March 3 2005 (Schingoethe Part 2)

Spink America
November 1996 (Western Reserve Historical Society sale)
December 2 1997 (Important Coins and Banknotes)

Stack's
January 1999 (Reed Sale)
January 2002
John J. Ford Collection Part X

Unknown Auction House
March 18 1955 (Hans Schulman)
1979 (Van B. Elliott sale)
April 27-28 1981 (Vacca sale)
1984 (Wilmington)
1985 (Leidman Sale)
January 1999 (Reed/Leney & Rollinson Archive Sale)

- Greg

I've decided to add another column to the spreadsheet to denote whether a note/auction lot was known to be from the ABN archives sale. This will allow us to sort the data by the likelihood that the note is a repeat of one already captured in our census. Here are the options for that column and the logic being used to determine which option is used:

(blank) = Unknown. No information in auction description to ascertain the status. May also mean that there has not been enough investigation to determine whether the chain of custody for the note provides evidence that it was or was not from the ABN sale.

Y = Yes, the note was in the ABN sale.

• Auction description clearly calls the note out as being from that sale
• Auction description sales "SENC before the ABN sale", or similar language

N = No, the note was not in the ABN sale

• Auction description clearly states "not from the ABN sale"
• Note appeared in a sale that predates the ABN sale (e.g. before September 1990)
• Note marked as Haxby Plate note (or other plate note from books predating ABN sale

P = Probably in the ABN sale

• Note is marked as having the ABN stamp on the back in sales after 1990

If you can think of any other options or criteria I'd be interested to know about them.

- Greg

I found some previously overlooked lots on the Stack's site, including the John J. Ford Part VI lots (a lot of uncut proof sheets from the ABN sale and a 1966 Hamilton's sale of the Lucius S. Ruder collection) and a Lyn Knight sale recently, so the count is now up to 7081 rows. I haven't bothered to run through the other stats for so small an increase, but if anyone is interested I can. In the meantime, I'll continue updating the ABN sale column as per the previously described method.

- Greg

I just finished collecting the nearly 800 entries from the Heritage archives. I'll integrate those (and a few others) with the main body of entries once I have them reformatted.

- Greg

The reformatting and integration are now complete. The merged list now contains 7899 entries and can be downloaded here: All_Lots.xls.

- Greg

One of the areas where I could use assistance is in processing this All_Lots files. Specifically, the task that I could use the most help with is determining which of the listed lots originally entered the collecting community at the 1990 Christie's sale (so they can be excluded from the list that is later used to augment the census).

Many of the entries have already been tagged accordingly, but many more remain untagged and unanalyzed. Some of the clues being used were already mentioned, and some are coming out as the file is processed. It's a real learning experience, but I know it is also going to be time consuming.

- Greg

I refreshed the All_Lots and Obsolete Proofs files this morning. The 1978 NASCA auction lots are listed in the New Arrivals tab of the All_Lots file.

- Greg

Regarding your list of auction catalogs posted 11/20/2008 (see above), I can provide some information:

Under NASCA, the "May 1984 #57 Lepczyk" is indeed a Lepczyk catalog, not a NASCA.

Under STACK'S, the "January 1999 (Reed sale)" is the Jan 12-13 1999 "Americana" sale.

Under UNKNOWN AUCTION HOUSE:

3/18/55 auction was indeed held by Hans Schulman
Van B Elliott was held by NASCA (you have it previously listed under NASCA as the 4/30/79 sale)
Vacca sale is a NASCA sale
Wilmington is a NASCA sale
1985 Leidman is probably the Kagin's 8/1985 sale, less likely the 4/20/85 McLaughlin & Robinson sale (altho I'm not familiar at all with the McL & R sale)

I have some of these in stock, listed here:

http://home.att.net/~numismatics/Coin-A ... talogs.htm

Thanks for the information. I'll check your listings and see what other catalogues you have that I'm looking for.

- Greg

For the record, there were a lot of interesting catalogues on Preturb's site... I bought about a dozen... got a lot of work coming in the mail soon. I can't wait.

I just received the catalogues I ordered from Preturb's site. I now have weeks of work ahead of me. Thanks again, Bryce!

- Greg

Yesterday I processed the oldest catalogue that came in... the July 13-15 1963 North-East Ohio Coin Club auction from Federal Brand Enterprises. There were only 10 proofs in that catalogue, but I found it fascinating just the same. Three of those were from NY, and all of them full sheets. In fact, it seems that all of the proof listings in that auction were sheets, except the CT lot. The estimates for those lots ranged from $200 - $300.

I uploaded the All_Lots file with those entries in the New Arrivals tab.