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THE OFFICIAL RED BOOK: A GUIDE BOOK OF UNITED STATES COINS 2020 (MEGA RED DELUXE EDITION). $27.48 (regularly $50)
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THE OFFICIAL RED BOOK: A GUIDE BOOK OF UNITED STATES COINS 2020. Starting at $8.78
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THE OFFICIAL RED BOOK: A GUIDE BOOK OF UNITED STATES PAPER MONEY. Under $20
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PAPER MONEY OF THE UNITED STATES. $40 - $60
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STANDARD CATALOG OF WORLD COINS, 1901-2000. Over $50
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WHITMAN ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MEXICAN MONEY -- VOLUME 1
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GRADING COINS BY PHOTOGRAPHS. $14.96
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THE OFFICIAL ANA GRADING STANDARDS FOR UNITED STATES COINS. $14.95
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MAKING THE GRADE. $30
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0:03
what's good everybody I don't know if I'd say that's a coin Channel how are you doing everybody this is Charles
0:09
Morgan from coin week and we've been streaming this week a few topics that I
0:14
think are important for collectors that is how to properly store your coins and
0:19
the best available products on the market how to magnify your clients
0:25
looking at some of the most popular and highest quality loops and magnifiers on
0:32
the market today I will finish this short series of streams with a video
0:41
about essential reference books or claim collecting books that you need in order
0:47
to succeed in the Hobby there is no perfect book in the coin collecting
0:52
market and I'm gonna give you an honest breakdown of my feelings related to each
1:02
of these books some of the books may have a slight criticism to them but I
1:07
will not present any of these to you if I did not recommend that you purchase them coin week has a series of essays
1:16
about books as they've come out into the market that we've published in the last few years called first read I think even
1:23
our editor's choice which is very seldom given to books has been given to books
1:29
where we do find things here or there that we find not not you know to our
1:36
standards there are some books that have come out in news matic marketplace that we have not reviewed and and chose not
1:44
to review because we didn't we didn't want to we didn't want to put anything out about them because we felt that they
1:50
weren't up to any of our standards and we wouldn't want to recommend our readers to invest the money and time to
1:58
read these books now that doesn't mean that every book that hasn't been published or written about on quayne week is a bad book it's just we've run
2:04
into situations where we're like you know don't like this book at all we're not gonna we're not going to promote it so so with that said
2:12
any criticism I make for any of these books or the way these books are put together is meant to just be a light
2:18
critique it's not a damning statement I wouldn't show you a book if I didn't
2:23
think you should buy it or read it or put in your collection but I do want to make you aware of things that I see and
2:29
these are my own personal feelings they don't reflect the staff the staff could have their own opinions and there are
2:34
certainly not critiques that the writers most of these writers and publishers do as much as they can with the limited
2:41
amount of time and money that is available to put these reference books together so having put all of that out
2:47
in the open and if there's any biases or things that I have that might seem like
2:54
a conflict of interest I will let you know I have been involved in the publication of a few of these books either behind the scenes or you know
3:02
through some sort of collaboration with the authors or the editors so the first
3:07
one is the essential book this is the book that got me started into coins this is the the red book the guidebook the
3:15
United States coins originally published in 1947 by RS yeoman published by Whitman every year
3:22
since this is the 73rd edition my first red book was purchased for me by my
3:28
grandmother Ruth and it was the 1986 Edition this is actually one you can't
3:35
get in stores because this is the presentation Edition given to the red book contributors of which I have been
3:43
off and on for the past five or six years it was signed by Jeff Jarrett and you know every contributor gets one
3:49
every year it's sort of the badge of honor you get for contributing the red book now the red book is an all-in-one
3:56
type of book it has prices of course it has copious illustrations and very basic
4:05
although more more of a detail than you would think descriptions of pretty much every coin
4:13
colonial coin and many medals and tokens struck in the United States since the
4:22
since the English colonization began and my only criticism with the red book
4:28
if you're an advanced or sophisticated collector is the read books pricing us us does not accurately reflect the
4:37
certified coin market if you want a a red book that is larger and more
4:43
sophisticated and the last few years Whitman has put out this monster called
4:49
the mega red book no you can see how big this thing is it's the telephone book size thing it's it's very large has a
4:57
retail price of about fifty dollars although and our our website and some
5:03
other places you can get it for less than that the thing about the mega red book is that the photographs of the
5:10
coins are larger and the detailed
5:15
information about them is as expanded you see an expanded grading information
5:28
and this information is not precise to any particular grade you would see in
5:34
the certified market for instance for the 1834 crosslet for gold coin here the
5:43
five dollar half ago their grades explained au 50 53 55 and 58 in one
5:53
paragraph and you're basically given you
5:59
know a sliding interpretation of what these grades are and if you're buying a coin that the price can go from four
6:07
thousand to ten thousand dollars in that scale I think you'd probably want something more detailed than what can be
6:14
fit in this book considering it it covers the same quantity of coins that
6:20
the the regular red book covers but in a more expanded format as far as the
6:26
pricing is concerned the pricing here is slightly expanded and does take into
6:32
account some options which they give you a precise auction data for below the
6:37
price grid the red book is not to be mistaken for a
6:44
quick trip to the heritage or Stax powers auction prices realized list or
6:52
maybe PCGS coin facts or ng C's coin
6:59
Explorer to see what the different online auctions publicly realized prices
7:05
for points and the different certified grades have been I recommend more than
7:11
anything before you enter into the coin market if price is a consideration that
7:16
you're very very specific about that you look at online resources before you go
7:22
to print however online resource is only telling part of this story and and I think that
7:28
a combination of your online resource and these you know veritable forests
7:36
fonts of information is is how you want to approach collecting coins now from coins
7:43
to paper money we go and there are two resources I use primarily for US coins
7:52
there's a simple one is Whitman's the United States paper money you can find
7:58
this and pretty much any bookstore that has a hobby section for coins or your coin local coin dealer maintenance stock
8:05
these in if you have a brick-and-mortar retail shop I recommend you you pick up a case of these so you can inform your
8:11
customers and and hopefully that means you sell more currency this is this is affordable it's an under $20.00 book it
8:18
has copious illustrations good quality illustrations probably the largest
8:23
illustrations of paper money of the two books I'm going to reference and you get
8:29
you know pricing table some printing quantities and that's fairly well laid
8:35
out it is arthur and ira freiburg are responsible for it but they also have
8:41
and i actually use this more more often they have an expanded version of this
8:48
which is much more detailed there's a hardback and a soft back in you're paying between I think 40 and $60
8:55
this is the hardback it is the $60 version but I find that it's a little more durable again you get that the
9:02
photographs lecture the same information but I do feel like the way this is laid out is is as more more authoritative and
9:11
there's more room for them to expand some of the information so these are the two books for currency and they they do
9:17
have a section of four confederate notes they have you know small size large size
9:24
national bank notes and the the book starts with the colonial currency and
9:31
there's a section on that although that's not as well illustrated as I would like it to be but anyway those are
9:37
the two books on paper money that I recommend that you use and they have become they have been very helpful for
9:43
us as we've written a number of articles on paper money over the years for coin week now another important facet of coin
9:51
collecting and I think it's one of the main pillars of coin collecting is to understand the fundamentals of clean
9:59
grading it's a it's a sad it's a sad statement I think I'm the hobby that
10:05
most collectors have have not kept up their precise understanding of coin
10:11
grading and have allowed the industry to sort of use where the market is to shift
10:18
the definitions of certain grades this we call coin inflation or grade
10:23
inflation I guess and it is run rampant in the coin industry for the last 20 or 30 years it was a gradual a slide from M
10:31
s65 being the coveted gem grade it's an MS 65 today being a middling grade where
10:38
the better grade points are grading six seven seven plus eight and so this this
10:43
shift has meant that the differences between coins and the lower tiers of the
10:49
mint state spectrum up to Mint has become one nebulous and more interchangeable and where Jimmy coin in
10:57
the early 80s would have you know graded ms 65 when it was offered at an auction
11:03
today would be like a 7 plus or an 8 or the CAC sticker even so we've seen it we've seen a complete redefinition of
11:10
these grades so I think understanding the grades is important especially if
11:16
you collect circulating coins I find to be honest that when you're grading a
11:21
mints that coin a mint state coin you're looking at you know strike and luster you're looking at originality the
11:28
surfaces you're looking for hits and dings how strong the coin was you know
11:33
how nice the planchette was and how the defects in the planchette are covered up by the strike and but when you get into
11:40
the circulated grades you're talking about which details can be omitted where is the typical wear pattern and what
11:48
kind of damage naturally occurs to a coin when it circulates what color is a coin take on as it circulates like how
11:55
can you tell it's been cleaned and then just read to them later all of these things are very important and I find
12:01
that it's even more important to know these factors for collecting than it is
12:06
the midstate side of the spectrum because most of the raw points you're
12:12
gonna find where you're going to cherry pick those varieties or you're gonna get those those those circulation poles if
12:18
they even exist anymore you know a couple old bu rolls of silver coins it's
12:25
easy to figure out how many hits are there but once you start getting into you know the circulated grades like
12:30
knowing which ones are the you know extra fine extra fine 45 very fine very good that these are these are harder and
12:38
I've even heard from professional graders at the services that much harder
12:43
to grade circulating coins in mint state a lot of guys don't have the time to sit
12:48
there and like split hairs over you know okay there's there's 80% of the wheat stocks are left on this 99s VDB and they
12:56
just don't have the they don't have the time and and certainly they're not getting the preponderance of the coins
13:02
that they're grading are in that state so and I'm gonna go over these these books in the order of my precedent the
13:09
precedents that I feel they deserve from the one passable to outstanding and so
13:18
the first one I look at here which I I think is passable and as a grading book I'm much more interested in the
13:24
perspective than actually how it comes across this is a cue David Bowers grading coins by photographs second
13:32
edition published by Whitman it's a spiral back book so it's fairly sturdy and what Bowers does in the way he
13:39
presents as he breaks things down series by series there's information about sharpness and the history and then he
13:46
goes coin by coin through the different grades starting with a mint state 6270
13:55
remember I say that's that's a very important spectrum but you only get in one paragraph this is why I'm going from
14:01
this book to others I think that these short changes some of these grades and
14:07
focuses primarily on the lower circulated grade so that's one of the places you might want to definitely care
14:13
about let me give you an example hopefully this doesn't violate fair use but for very first shield nickel for
14:19
instance for very fine obverse the frame details and leaves show more wear with
14:24
much leaf detail gone the shield stripes show more wear and some vertical lines will begin to blend
14:30
together and of course you read this as a progression you know and so you follow that progression and then you're within
14:37
ten points two grades and that's that's what you get for two grades the photographs are fairly good they are
14:44
they look like they're about coin size so if you're used to looking at going
14:49
through a loop of courses so SAC dollars not coin size that's a certainly not plain size but anyway so I would say I
14:55
would give this this as a passable coin grading book but a Bowers perspective is interesting and as the Dean of
15:03
numismatics it's always worth checking out what he has to say moving on something a little bit better in this
15:08
again edited by Ken Brissette who's now retired but also influenced by Bowers
15:15
who has written a narrative another women title this is the the AA's the
15:22
official American Numismatic Association grading standards for United States coin this is a another spiral edition and
15:30
here you see the breakdown grade by grade this page it's proof
15:38
sixty five sixty four sixty three sixty two you thought they talked about natural coloration of coins deceptive
15:44
practices things you need to look at this is really written as a as a technical guide with some good consumer
15:52
advocacy points brought to bear here I'm gonna go back if I can to this shield
15:58
nickel that we were talking about in the bowers book and I want to read to you how they treat the same issue the same
16:06
grade we are looking at the extra fine no no we're looking at very fine thirty
16:11
to twenty and they write very fine thirty being choice very fine twenty
16:17
being typical you see the narratives actually smaller but I believe the coin photographs are larger for very fine 30
16:25
they say leaves showed nearly full detail vertical lines of shield are worn
16:30
but sharp and separated some horizontal lines and shield are missing so that's
16:36
in my opinion more concise a little easier to follow the pictures are larger
16:43
and again all of the front matter of this book to tell you about I appeal
16:49
deceptive practices things you need to look out for when grading coins I think
16:54
it's invaluable and this goes to the entire us series and so that is a that
16:59
is another book I think this book retails for $20 so roughly the same price and you can again you can usually
17:04
find them online a little cheaper including at our supply site the best in my opinion
17:10
grading book on the market it is also the most expensive but it's not like
17:15
hugely expensive it's about double the price and it's published by to our friends at coin world this is coin world's making the grade
17:22
Beth Dicer edited this book this is the third edition where coin world's making
17:27
the grade makes great strides over what the other publications did is that the
17:33
coin photographs are much larger okay they break down color for the copper
17:41
coins when it comes to that that shield nickel we're talking about I'm going to read what they have to say
17:47
so you can see so we're going to talk about the same coin coin after coin this is the page with the shield nickels okay
17:54
so for very fine 20 the coin World Book says moderate wear is evident but more
17:59
details of merging on design elements offers more details show in shield and
18:04
frame cross and laurel leaves letters on motto are bolder reverse at numeral 5 is
18:10
bolder and more details of stars evident letters and legends are distinct so you see in that not only are they showing
18:17
you where to look for precise descriptions the coin of photograph is
18:24
larger and you can see in that photograph exactly the things they're talking about I think they did a great
18:30
job with this book there's a lot of there's a lot of history about the different coin series and then they are
18:36
showing the grades like for this a flowing hair 1/2 nine page MMS 60 63 64
18:42
and 65 now they're not gonna have all the eccentric grades you know moment
18:47
plus grades or anything like that but it's very good another feature of the book I like is they have these coin
18:54
where heat maps they're in full-color and they show where the typical wear
19:00
patterns form on these coins as they circulate I think this is very important as you're learning how to grade because
19:06
you want to look for the problem areas first especially if you're trying to tell the difference between circulated and uncirculated coin so there is the
19:14
the coin rulebook I think it retails for $40 you get it slightly cheaper online and on our site but that's the retail
19:20
price now the best coin book does not compare in my opinion to a free product
19:28
that you can get and that is the PCGS of photo grading app that they offer Phil
19:36
Arnold at PCGS is one of the finer photographers of numismatic products
19:42
working in the industry so you get to see how only his photography but you also get to see how coins are graded by
19:49
PCGS and standards PCGS and things you see are both top two your grading services they have their own eccentric
19:56
standards that are site that are slightly different at each company and so you get to see how P suggests
20:03
views the coin grading spectrum and they show they step it up with great
20:08
photography and it's free now I would look at that I would look at these I
20:13
would take in all the information they're trying to give you because there's a years and years of experience here so sometimes the best information
20:20
doesn't cost you anything like like coin we Becca doesn't cost anything but but yeah but seriously folks these are the
20:27
books that I would have in my collection or I have in my bookshelf that I would use and another thing of Frederick
20:34
Brandt points out and his comedy just made us that uh older auction catalogues
20:39
and current auction catalogues couldn't agree more the best purchase you'll ever make is to go on ebay after an auctions
20:46
done and buy a major auction catalog for pennies on the dollar and read everything in there and see the beautiful photographs and see and see
20:53
what's going on because for the bigger points that they'll have a full-page photographs now let's move on the world
20:58
coins another great segment in the market and I'm going to explain what's
21:03
going on with Krause II a little bit Krause II for years has made these robust catalogs covering world coins
21:12
from the 17th century to the present this is the first the seventh edition of
21:19
the 1601 to 1700 book when Hubert and I were writing our book that's coming out
21:25
in about a month and a half on modern world coins you know this this book was a an essential element the world coins
21:32
1901 to 2000 and and the thing about these books is they have pretty much
21:40
defined world coin collecting in the American market for generations
21:46
but if you look at the size of these books you're looking at tens of
21:52
thousands of pages okay and right now it
21:58
used to be George Kuh Hodge who has left Krause II before they were sold and now
22:04
I'm not sure if it's Thomas Michael or who the who staffing these books anymore
22:10
as they've been purchased by another publisher but one person and no number of contributors
22:17
is going to keep the pricing and this book consistent accurate and reflecting real-time pricing as as seen by
22:25
countless coin coin sellers across the globe countless auctions American
22:30
auctions European auctions Asian options it's just not possible and so if you look at these books as price guides
22:36
which is what they're kind of sold because you're you're sort of not getting a good price guide you're
22:42
getting a fantastic catalogue with I get a very has standardized system the
22:48
Krause numbering system you're getting pictures and a little bit of biographical information but if you're
22:54
serious specialist you're out of luck because there's there's far deeper writing and other things this is really
23:01
an overview if or if you get a coin you don't know what it is but you're like I think that's currency I think that's I
23:07
think that's a German state coin or whatever this is a great resource the only resource I would recommend for like
23:13
looking things up if you don't know what they are you have a general idea of the date it's for a price guide again you
23:19
have to go to auction catalogs you have to talk to knowledgeable dealers there is nothing in print that I can tell and
23:25
I'm the European market and on the US market that like satisfies my definition of accurate up-to-date scientific method
23:33
pricing for world coins getting a little deep into coins and I would say the
23:40
Whitman has put out a few good books for Canadian coins and for Mexican coins for
23:46
Mexican coins I recommend two books right now for the generalist and that is
23:53
Don Bailey and Louis Bailey's Whitman encyclopedia of Mexican money volumes 1
23:58
& 2 volume 2 is covers 1905 to date is
24:04
essentially structured like the red book but with Mexican coins of course Don
24:09
Bailey has passed away a few years ago but Mexican coins were his life's work
24:15
and there is no better reference in English probably not even in Spanish for Mexican coins than this getting into
24:23
paper money I think a great opportunity for collectors who want to bored of maybe collecting a coins that
24:31
they think they're too pricey or collecting us paper money a great affordable area to enter into full of
24:38
variety is modern world paper money here again don't go for the price guide
24:44
element but for catalog in a visual depiction Crossy standard catalog of world paper money and this is the 25th
24:51
edition I think this is the most recent there they're behind they're gonna probably skip a year I think before the
24:57
next ones come out but but this would be that the book I would buy of course for
25:03
variety hunters you have specialist books you know I recommend the cherry pickers and guide for for generalists or
25:09
just looking for modern coins I've asked them for a few times if they would consider not putting the classic coins
25:15
in the cherry pickers guide and just do modern coins so they can fit more I'm in there it's a very political process what
25:21
coins getting cherry pickers guide because they're weighing how much space they have there's new varieties that are found and they're trying to put
25:27
varieties in the book that gage collect your interest I think we're waiting for the next edition of Bill Feliz cherry
25:33
pickers guide and I think it could be lucky to find one in stock right now because most of last print run has sold
25:40
out and then if you want to get into some other series I think if you're collecting commemorative coins for
25:48
instance and this books probably out of print but you have the the Whitman Bauer series red book on commemorative coins
25:55
which is good for the someone getting into it if you want a little deeper information there is Anthony sweet X
26:01
encyclopedia of commemorative coins in the United States which is I think this is like 150 dollar book you might be
26:09
able to find this in this gym some of the corniest writing you'll ever see any
26:14
miss Maddocks mostly because walter brie but silver and gold commemorative coins buy sweet set can bring this was
26:21
published in the late 80s it was under first coin Vestas there's a lot of
26:27
really bogus pricing information but as far as the entertainment value and the
26:33
information about the commemorative coin programs you can get much of what you see it's Wyatt X and cyclopædia written
26:40
actually sir kind of more frivolous manner in the end the older reference and you can get you might even get this
26:47
in this book for like eight or ten dollars and it's full of information there's also how to print far out of
26:53
print that were said a much bigger volume of commemorative coins that he published I guess when he was with
26:58
powers of Marino another book recently that I think is really great if you
27:04
collect gold coins at the New Orleans Mint you know that winner has another standard reference document or is Doug
27:10
winner is probably one of the outside of the queue David Bower is probably the hardest-working coin dealer writers in
27:15
the industries he's he's the guy for crusty old gold classic ghost gold Doug winner is the guy who has most of the
27:22
information and has published it we published Doug's blogs all the time on Queen week but this is a great book that
27:28
came out recently the ACS copper grading book is you might have to go to the a CD
27:37
and copy they're probably very limited the ACC has maintained their grading
27:42
standards for about sixty or seventy years and and this book articulates it
27:48
to way much clearer than anything I've ever read before also this is a specialist book I mean we're talking probably around 100 dollars of this book
27:55
and then if you just can't get enough coins and you want to learn more about
28:00
the history you might want to find this book or a books of modern printing of this book this is numismatic art in
28:07
America it will explain a lot about why our coins throughout the years look the
28:12
way they look this is by Cornelius Vermeil a very notable very wealthy coin
28:17
collector who was active in the early and mid 20th century this is this was
28:24
basically written as a collegiate text again not for everybody but if you're really fascinated about the art and the
28:31
history of record the representation of Liberty and u.s. coins all the symbolism
28:36
and motif that you found on the classic coins that we all love for mule tackles that subject and then some in this book
28:43
it's really a cultural history of American coinage so to me this is based
28:49
these are the building blocks this is the this is the Lego set that you need to
28:54
consider if you're going into these different areas this is like these are the cornerstones after this you start
28:59
expanding based on your interest I love FAO points I have an FAO clean guide but that's not for everybody if you like
29:05
German coins there's some great German coin books out there if you are collecting certain periods there's great
29:11
books out there so never stop never stop learning and it never hesitates it's a
29:19
drop to drop that extra bit of money on a book to really kind of figure out do I
29:25
want to go in this direction what coins do I want why do I want them so even a hundred hundred fifty dollar book can
29:32
have such a fundamental impact on what you do for the rest of your coin collecting experience so most of the
29:40
authors who create these products are not making a profit and you know they're covering their cost there no they're not
29:46
even covering their time really to put this stuff together and so by supporting
29:51
numismatic authors you're supporting the perpetuation of knowledge you're supporting the growth of the coin
29:57
industry and who knows you may just completely revolutionize your approach
30:02
to coin collecting you may change it you may decide I never thought in a million years I'd want to collect Civil War
30:08
tokens but after eating this I can't get enough of them and that's the power and fly some of the writing that you'll see
30:14
learn how to grade learn how to identify coins and and once you have those two
30:21
things down you're off the races so have a good weekend everybody
30:26
I promise we got a podcast we're getting ready to record with Jeff Devlin he's
30:31
going to be calling me about an hour so we'll try to have that up for you tomorrow or Monday and we still have
30:38
cool coins that upload we had a little bit of problems with the production but we've got it fixed now so that's what I
30:43
got for you happy shopping happy reading happy collecting have a happy weekend
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