Franklin Mint issues a stunning new medal...
MKW
doing a new tastefully designed medal.
http://www.franklinmint.com/Atocha-25th-Anniversary-Discovery-Comm-Cover--P10945C332.aspx
Its only silver plated for the look..keep in mind with silver at $25
an ounce ... the days of $29-$40 professionally made solid silver
medals are gone.
Though they don't run a mint anymore they can still developed some
excellent product. The new owners are cleaning up the product line
and the last set of owners that liked the tacky infomercials are out!
Reid Goldsborough
I'd hardly call this piece either stunning or tastefully designed, as
you said, or spectacular, as the Franklin Mint says. What's more, the
Franklin Mint page you linked to illustrates only one side of this
medal. Unless this piece is uniface, and there's no indication on the
page that it is, illustrating only one side of any numismatic piece is
the height of amateurishness.
I find the obverse of the piece, the side that's illustrated, poorly
designed. The rim and the reeding, which are a design nothing, take up
far too much space, leaving less space for the medal's devices and
legend. The boat in the ocean is competent but hardly creative or
inspirational, unlike the design on the coins that the Atocha carried,
most notably the Pieces of Eight (Cobs).
A silver-plated medal? Please. The price of silver today isn't that
high. Further, under "Specifications," no specifications for this medal
are listed, such as diameter and weight, only more hyped language about
Mel Fisher, who at best can be described as controversial.
According to a CBS News obit about him, Mel Fisher broke environmental
laws and ruined underwater habitat in his sea salvage work, with a judge
fining his company more than half a million dollars for this. According
to a New York Times obit, he bought modern forgeries and sold them as
shipwreck coins in his gift shop in Key West, FL, later admitting this
and refunding purchasers.
--
Consumer: http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur: http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit: http://rg.ancients.info/bogos
Zapp Brannigan
"Reid Goldsborough" <reidgol...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:45f492....@news.alt.net...
> I've bought some Franklin Mint products in the past, which I like, but I'd
> hardly call this piece either stunning or tastefully designed, as you said, or
> spectacular, as the Franklin Mint says. What's more, the Franklin Mint page
> you linked to illustrates only one side of this medal. Unless this piece is
> uniface, and there's no indication on the page that it is, illustrating only
> one side of any numismatic piece is the height of amateurishness.
Hey Mr. Know-it-all:
The study of medals is EXONUMIA, not numismatics, you pendatic putz!
Reid Goldsborough
> Hey Mr. Know-it-all:
> The study of medals is EXONUMIA, not numismatics, you pendatic putz!
You sound like another fine person. Exonumia is a part of numismatics,
not separate from it as you indicate above. (Only response you'll get
from me, but feel free of course to carry on with your troll attempts,
transparent and inane though they are, here as elsewhere. Your other
troll attempts seem to be largely ignored. You elicited a response with
this one, which means you've had a troll success. Congrats!)
Nick Knight
>You sound like another fine person. Exonumia is a part of numismatics,
Funny ... what a weird nit to pick. Anyway ...
I spent a short time looking at the FM page myself. I was fresh out of bed,
so I had to rub my eyes a couple of times since I couldn't find an image of
the reverse. Figured I was just missing it somehow. I too concluded that
it wasn't pictured but figured it probably did exist.
If I wanted one of these (and I don't), I'd gamble and look for one on the
secondary market. What was it, $47?? For a silver plated piece? I did not
see what shipping would cost, but it just wasn't calling to me, either. For
$47, I think they could afford an ounce of silver to the thing, eh?
Nick
Bremick
"Nick Knight" <bhnc...@mr2ice.com> wrote in message
news:4cbce7bf$1$avpx$mr2...@news.eternal-september.org...
I have to agree (mostly) with Reid on this one. The design is hardly crisp
or inspiring, there's way too much hokey hype in the promo, no specs at all
and relatively expensive at $37.50 + 7.95 S&H. Plus there's that
invaluable COA which surely will help sales in the secondary market for a
plated private mint piece. This might have been more appropriate as a
bronze souvenir token offered for sale to tourists at the Florida Keys
treasure museum.
Otherwise, it's a great piece.
Zapp Brannigan
Greek, and nummus, meaning "coin" in Latin; thus, "out[side]-of-[the
category]coins". Usually, the term "exonumia" is applied to these objects in the
United States, while the equivalent British term is paranumismatica.
"Reid Goldsborough" <reidgol...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:45fc1k....@news.alt.net...
Nick Knight
>The noun exonumia is derived from two classical roots: exo, meaning
>"out-of" in Greek, and nummus, meaning "coin" in Latin; thus,
>"out[side]-of-[the category]coins". Usually, the term "exonumia" is
>applied to these objects in the United States, while the equivalent
>British term is paranumismatica.
Who cares? Here, let me explain:
This is eBay's COIN and PAPER MONEY index. Note that EXONUMIA is listed
inside this category. As dealers of this material often appear inside coin
shows. As some dealers of this stuff tend to list their auctions here,
inside a coin group, and rightly so.
Inside or outside, you've got to be able to come up with something better to
try and nit about, eh?
Nick
MKW
issued a medal without a reverse unless it was an applique mounted on
another product...like a watch. Danbury Mint is offering 1 ounce .999
Silver Presidential medals for $48ish each. Same price the US mint
charges for a silver commem. But the cachet and medal would be a very
tight margin if it were pure silver at $37.50. The die work is
fully sculpted so there is cost there. Sure its not the same as a
1970's Franklin Mint medal..or any piece the struck till they closed
their mint in 2002. But its a nice well-designed piece with a
colorful cachet. It will be blistered into the cachet. These days it
costs a lot to develope something like that. And its made in USA. I
will always support that. But the ad does clearly state it is plated.
Bremick
"MKW" <mwelb...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:5c07d550-10d6-4fcb...@j2g2000yqf.googlegroups.com...
I find it disconcerting that the item is reportedly plated with "genuine
silver" recovered from the Atocha. Aside from "big deal", to me this
indicates that original silver artifacts were melted just to provide silver
to plate this medal thingy. As a fan of history and archaeology, that in
itself would steer me away from it.
Phil DeMayo
> I find it disconcerting that the item is reportedly plated with "genuine
> silver" recovered from the Atocha. Aside from "big deal", to me this
> indicates that original silver artifacts were melted just to provide silver
> to plate this medal thingy. As a fan of history and archaeology, that in
> itself would steer me away from it.
Bruce, a large number of silver ingots were a part of the Atocha haul.
In the past some of these ingots were used to cast "Atocha" coins in
molds made from some of the original coins in the horde. Some of these
were sold without mentioning the fact that they were copies.....these
were the "modern counterfeits" mentioned by Reid.
Reid Goldsborough
> This is eBay's COIN and PAPER MONEY index. Note that EXONUMIA is listed
> inside this category. As dealers of this material often appear inside coin
> shows. As some dealers of this stuff tend to list their auctions here,
> inside a coin group, and rightly so.
This is exactly right. Anybody contending that exonumia is not a part of
numismatics by citing the etymology of the word exonumia clearly knows
very little about either exonumia or numismatics.
Along with eBay, take a look around any coin show. "I'm sorry. You can't
sell your exonumia here. This is a numismatic event." The Wikipedia
entry on numismatics correctly lists exonumia as a numismatic subfield.
The current dean of numismatics, Q. David Bowers, includes exonumia in
his book The Expert's Guide to Coin Collecting & Investing in Rare Coins.
I think this is probably just more numbingly lame trolling, exposing the
troller for exactly who he is. On the other hand, talking, and thinking,
about the place of exonumia within numismatics can be interesting. There
are those of course who specialize in exonumia. For me, it's an
interesting numismatic side road that I travel on sometimes when off the
main highway.
Bremick
"Phil DeMayo" <flip...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:899bff58-d9f1-42ad...@t20g2000yqa.googlegroups.com...
__________
Probably it's just me, but I would consider melting historical silver ingots
for any modern venture to be unfortunate, regardless of how crude or
"uncollectable" some might consider those ingots to be. I'll get over it.
Zapp Brannigan
> For me, it's an interesting numismatic side road that I travel on sometimes
> when off the main highway.
The Hershey Highway, no doubt.
Reid Goldsborough
> But its a nice well-designed piece
I still don't see how this is piece is "well-designed" or as you said
earlier "stunning." All this is aesthetics and partly subjective, of
course. And your opinion is just as valid as mine or anyone else's. But
let me argue my opinion a bit further.
I'd describe the design -- the obverse design, anyway, which as
mentioned for some strange reason is the only side illustrated -- as
competent at best and probably more accurately as pedestrian,
undistinguished, and boring. There's no creativity with the main obverse
device, no symbolism, and little artistry. It's just a ship on the ocean.
Compare this to what designers did more than 400 years ago with the
coins that the Antocha carried. With the most common cob type, the
pillars and waves type, depicted on its most interesting side were two
pillars and waves with lots of interesting lettering and numbering
interspersed. The pillars represented the Pillars of Hercules, which was
the name given by the ancients to the rocks forming the eastern end of
the Strait of Gibraltar separating the Mediterranean Sea from the
Atlantic Ocean. In the ancient as well as the medieval world, the
Pillars of Hercules were believed to be at the end of the Earth. The
waves represented the world beyond, the previously untraversed ocean
leading to the New World, the exploration (and exploitation) of which
Spain was dominating.
Instead of a staid pictorial representation of a ship as on this medal,
you have a mulileveled symbolic depiction of a world in transition on a
coin that served the purpose of, for better or worse, transferring a
great deal of the mineral wealth of the New World back to the old one.
Rather than spending $37.50 on this boring silver-plated medal of
unknown size and weight with its clumsy thick rim and overlarge
denticles, better to save a little more and buy a genuine all-silver
400-year-old coin that was actually on a treasure ship. You can even buy
a small fraction, the 1/2-real denomination, in decent enough shape for
about the same price as this medal.
Daniel Sedwick, coauthor of the best book about these coins, The
Practical Book of Cobs, is among the reputable dealers who sells these
coins, in his case at both his Web site (www.sedwickcoins.com) and coin
shows. I bought an early shield-type cob, the largest eight-reales
denomination, minted between 1613 and 1616 in Potos� (then Peru, now
Bolivia), from him at an ANA show a few years ago and have read his book
as well. The coin is distinguished for having marvelous detail and by
*not* being a shipwreck/salvage coin, rather having made it back to
Europe (or the Orient) without experiencing the corrosive effects of
ocean water. I haven't yet, but need to photograph it ... on the to-do
list. <g>
Steve
a hasidic Jew with a long history of scams. He was the owner of the
Inter-Governmental Philatelic Corporation which cut deals with African
dictators to print "postage stamps" from those countries (some without
post offices) featuring Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, Disney cartoons and
sold in newspaper and Sunday supplement ads to American suckers "for
face value."
Later he bought the Morgan Mint and issued lots of offensive colorized
and gold plated state quarter garbage. He then bought the Franklin
Mint, fired all the employees, sold the minting equipment to the
Chinese (probably now being used for all the ebay fakes) and shut down
the Franklin Mint Museum. Most of the priceless items, such as
Marilyn Monroe's dresses and Jackie Kennedy's jewelry have disappeared
(probably now in Israel.)
MKW
ownership. They were stripping it down through the early 2000's.
Earlier the Resnicks downplayed FM's beautiful minting capabilities to
chase after the masses with low priced plates and items (not all
plates are cheap). The classic 1970's Joe Segel Franklin Mint
weakened in the early 80's under Warner Comm. and ended when the
Resnicks took over. The Resnicks liked Coca Cola Teddy Bears and not
finely minted medals. FM made medals are some of the finest minted
pieces out there...they also used minting to make some fine silver
plates, wall plaques etc in the 70's.
Moshe lead FM with some good idea...some good product..but those ideas
no doubt came from the FM long timers who are still there. The Morgan
Mint guys were just not agressive in creating classy cutting edge
graphics, advertising, and spending the $$$ needed to develope nice
products.
IGCP is a legitimate group that creates stamps for various small
countries...like SoftSky does for coins of the realm. The are
colorful and fun for collectors. There are some really nice Liberian
coins and stamps out there created through these types of orgs.
BTW the reverse of this Atocha Medal has a replica of an Atocha silver
coin.