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Contact info / ABOUT THE AUTHOR |
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Born and raised in the Mid-west, most of my life was spent in and around the Kansas City, Missouri area. Eventually I moved away from my roots to own my own business and I now reside in the beautiful Pacific Northwest. Like many other collectors I started collecting coins as a young boy, spurred on by my grandfather. As I reached my teens, coins were put aside for more interesting pursuits such as cars and girls… My grandfather passed away in my early twenties and two weeks after this event I saw an ad for a coin auction about an hour from my home. It immediately made me think of my grandfather and so I chose to attend. My purchases for that day included both 1811 & 1812 Bust Halves. I was intrigued by the beauty of these coins and the history behind them. Not to mention that I was in awe of the fact that I could purchase coins this old for so little money! (I only later learned that I over paid for them, but they still reside in my collection today as a reminder of the beginning of my second and now permanent relationship with coins.) From there, I proceeded to purchase coins from all eras and all denominations until I began to focus more clearly on the early bust coinage. I avidly began to pursue Bust Half die marriages when a local dealer introduced me to the Overton book in 1991. At the same time I also began collecting Bust Dimes. For the dime series, I was only able to find a modest pamphlet on the series by Abe Kosoff that was based on the collection of F.C.C. Boyd that Kosoff sold in 1945, labeled as the “World’s Greatest Collection”. Excited about breaking new ground, I began to build an attribution database and used it when looking for coins at the local coin shops and at a small monthly local show. My thoughts were to eventually publish a book on the subject. It was only after acquiring almost 90 die marriages that I learned about the book published by Dave Davis, Russ Logan, Alan Lovejoy, John McCloskey and Bill Subjack in 1984, Early United States Dimes 1796-1837. Once I read this excellent work I realized that my efforts were un-needed and so the project was put aside. Sometime in the mid 1990’s I began to purchase Bust Quarters. As I delved deeper into the series, I kept finding things which contradicted the recently printed Browning / Breen up-date. After talking with other collectors, I found that they had found many mistakes and errors in the book as well. It was welcome news when it was announced that someone was going to do another up-date of the Browning work. However, after many years of waiting for this to be accomplished, frustration mounted, and in the winter of 2003 it was decided that I would begin work towards a new reference on the Bust Quarter series. My intent was to do a volume that covered in-depth all that the series had to offer, as well as the historic background of the mint directly linked to the Bust Quarter production. Hopefully with the printing of my new book this has been accomplished.
I am currently a member of the following organizations:
John Reich Collectors Society (JRCS) Bust Half Nut Club (BHNC) Liberty Seated Collectors Club (LSCC) Bust Quarter Collectors Society (BQCS) Numismatic Bibliomania Society (NBS) Numismatic Literary Guild (NLG) Love Token Society (LTS) |
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Or E-Mail to: smt@earlyusquarters.com |
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Steve M. Tompkins P.O. Box 1946 |
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Please send any Questions or Comments to: |
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© 2009 Steve M. Tompkins All Rights Reserved |
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