The following was written by Chris.

To be blunt, the Central States show is probably my least favorite show of the year. I find it overly long for the amount of business that is usually done there. It’s typically one of the weaker shows of the year, and the location is far from ideal. While it’s convenient and very secure to have the hotel attached to the convention center, there is literally nothing else in the area within walking distance. If you want to eat anywhere other than the hotel restaurant, you have to Uber there. Schaumburg is inconveniently far away from Chicago, so trips into the city during this show rarely happen. (If there is a positive to the location, because there’s nowhere to go, more dealers than usual congregate in the hotel bar in the evenings. You can find yourself having conversations with dealers that otherwise you may normally not have the opportunity to socialize with.)

Having just complained for a paragraph about the show, I am happy to report that this particular Central States was great for us! I checked our Central States show sales going back to 2012, and this show actually doubled each one of them! I’m sure if I continued going back through the years, I’d find the same results. We sold multiple big-ticket items ($20k+ coins), which was great and also encouraging. It was still the usual struggle for Margie to get some of the dealers to look at our inventory, but most eventually relented and then proceeded to buy several coins from us. And just as importantly, buying was good. We came home with at least four double row boxes of new coins.

While I would grade the 2017 Central States show an A-, I heard mixed reviews from other dealers about the show. A few well known national dealers who used to take tables stopped doing so and just walked the floor, or just didn’t show up at all. Maybe it’s my imagination, but the width of the aisles on the bourse floor seem to be increasing. One might speculate that this is because fewer and fewer people are taking tables. I dunno.

As for the coin market, my personal experience with buying didn’t really indicate any changes occurring. Prices remain unchanged for the typical material I come home with. However, there are two positive things worth mentioning. First, we did find the big-ticket sales encouraging. Second, I spoke to a dealer friend of mine who had spoken to one of the bigger dealers in the industry and that particular dealer was very optimistic about the market. Yeah, I realize this pretty much qualifies as hearsay. But considering the source, I know the information was sound. Granted, I don’t know the details, like the “why” part of the optimism. I will be interested to see if their optimism holds at the next show and hopefully spreads!

Here's a neat letter and item we came across that was buried in our office. 

Many of you are probably already familiar with the famous Sacagawea Cheerios Dollar. For those who are not, definitely read on!

5,500 Sac Dollars were struck in 1999 and delivered to General Mills to distribute in cereal boxes in an effort to generate interest in the new dollar coin. It turned out that the Sac Dollars later struck for circulation exhibited a slightly different design, namely in the eagle's tailfeathers. The tailfeathers on the Cheerios Dollars have intricate detail, whereas the regular issue pieces have tailfeathers with no detail.

We found an article from 2007 which mentioned an actual sealed box of Cheerios that had the Sac Dollar promotion logo on it sold on eBay for a little over $200! What would YOU do if you had a sealed box from back then? Open it or sell it?

The image below is a close-up of a small area of an ecapsulated numismatic item. The first person to guess what item this image was taken from wins it! To take a guess, click the COMMENT ON THIS POST link in the lower right corner. Only guesses received via comments to this blog post will count. Good luck!

The following was posted by Chris.

I often get asked by customers if I have a personal coin collection and if so, what's in it. I thought I'd take advantage of our blog to post some selections. The majority of my collection is comprised of medals, mostly 19th and early 20th century European medals. While my expertise is primarily U.S. coins, I have always appreciated the intricate designs of medals.I also have several world coins and some U.S. coins in my collection. Here are some highlights you might enjoy seeing. 

1861 Great Britain Halfpenny NGC PF66 RB (Definitely one of my favorites. Finest RB of the date.)

1877-A France 5 Francs NGC MS66 (Semi-PL, tied for finest graded.)

1904-A Germany Mark NGC MS67 (I'm always a fan of attractive toning.)

1909 Germany Saxony-Leipzig University NGC MS67 (Amazingly, there is one finer, which I'd love to see.)

1902 Great Britain Halfpenny High Sea Level NGC MS66 BN (Not an exciting coin, but I like high-end/finest graded material.)

1894-A German New Guinea Mark NGC MS65 (Semi-prooflike. One of my favorite designs of any coin.)

1913 France 2 Centimes NGC MS63 RB (Nothing special. Just cool color.)

1842-Ng MA C.A.R. 8 Reales 42/37 PCGS AU50 (Many collectors love the sun design and I am no exception.)

1797 Great Britain SOHO "Cartwheel" Twopence NGC PF63 BN

1883 Hawaii Quarter PCGS MS64 CAC (The most prooflike example I've seen!)

France World War I Medal (Somewhat eerie but impressive design. Uninscribed reverse.)

1828 Germany Alexander Humbolt Geographer (Exquisite high relief design.)

1825 Germany Fredrich Blumenbach Anthropologist (I like the reverse design. Knocked it out of an NGC MS65 holder.)

1881 Austria Marriage of Prince Rudolph and Princess Stefanie of Belgium (Amazingly intricate design. Big fan of original cases.)

1837 Great Britain Royal Academy of Arts Award Medal (Awarded in 1874. Features the Belvedere Torso. It took me a few years to pry this out of the hands of a former colleague.)

1893 Columbian Exposition Medal (Struck/pressed in wood!)

New Orleans obsolete and national bank notes (I was born in Louisiana and moved up to MA from the NOLA area, so I have several of these in my collection.)