John Whitney's Quest for a US Currency Exhibit

My collection of coins started early with some remarkable "finds" in pocket change, originally looking mostly for coins with designs earlier than were being currently minted and then advanced to trips to the bank for rolls of coins to be "searched" and then re-rolled and exchanged for new rolls, a practice not unfamiliar to many early stage collectors. The years progressed into the late 1940's and beyond and then started the first of many numerous visits to Gimbel's Department Store (across the street from Macy's in New York City) which had an abundant array of coins and paper money displayed for sale; it was there that I met Jack Friedberg , who ran the coin department at Gimbel's. Jack sold me my first National Coin Albums and the 'RED BOOK" (A Guide Book of United States Coins, by R. S. Yeoman). The visits with Jack continued and then expanded to "mail order" when I was away at high school and then college until Jack retired from Gimbel's.

When I received my army commission as an officer in the U.S. Army Signal Corps and was sent to Germany, in 1956, it provided me the opportunity to learn, first hand, about the history, artistry and money of Western Europe. As a history buff, I was intrigued with the ancient and medieval coinage which was abundantly available in Europe and how the coinage was used as both for monetary value and political propaganda and communications as to who was "in charge" at the time of issue. I started assembling a library of books and catalogs to aid me in understanding how the coinage circulated and how it affected the political environments by the persons who controlled the mines and mints. At that time, I was concentrating on the coinage of the medieval era when siege coins were used as "necessity" money. Being a medieval castle construction "nut", it fit right in with my psyche.

When I returned back to the States, having basically completed the "basic" 1918-1960 U.S. coinage except for some pieces for which I was waiting for the "perfect strike", I started completing the U.S. gold and silver commemoratives set for which I had that 1892 Columbian half dollar given to me back in the 1930's. I continued absorb more information about the ancient and medieval coinage of Western Europe for its historical and artistic value and although that was my primary concentration, I also started another exhibit plan concentrating on the U.S. coins of 1796. The 1796 coinage intrigued me as to its artistic character and the fact that it was the only year that the U.S. mint issued every authorized denomination of coins dated the same year from the mint's inception in 1793 until 1849.

However, always in the back of my mind, was that memorable exhibit of U.S. currency that Farran Zerbe had setup at the Chase National Bank that my father had shown to me at the impressionable age of 8 or 9. I was dismayed when it had been permanently removed not that much later after I had only a few chances to view it. In the meantime, I had enlisted my father to try to obtain some of those unusual serial number one and solid serial numbered notes that were part of Chase's exhibit. It had seemed most logistical to me that being a "banker", those are the persons most likely to be able to get these notes. When it came to F to VF grade Type I & II series 1929 National Bank Notes, my father found many being taken in and given out of the bank teller's cash drawers in the normal course of business and sometimes they would even have fancy (radar or repeater) or low numbered serial numbers; but alas, precious few of any fancy serial numbered regular issue silver certificates were around "for face value exchange" at the bank. He did get to exchange quite a handful of large size series 1914 - 1918 FRN's in fine or a bit better condition along with about 50 series 1929 NBN's until he retired in 1958. From that point on, I was "on my own" to find the early and most artistic of the large size notes and the elusive fancy serial numbered notes remembered at the Chase exhibit. It was time to continue my quest through auction catalogs, the numismatic press and the dealers.

Unfortunately, I was a bit of a novice when it came to the currency part of the numismatic fraternity. I was basically a "coin guy" and dealt mostly with coin dealers, although many of them did deal in currency and had both reasonable stock and auction material in many of their auctions. The Bank Note Reporter was the newspaper for the currency enthusiast and the "Bibles" for currency information written by: Friedberg, Krause/Lemke, Oakes/Schwartz, Kelly, Newman, Hessler, Bart and others, all served me well for the information I needed to continue my quest for a collection to exhibit that would rival the one I had first seen now more than 60 years earlier on the sidewalk in front of the Chase National Bank of New York.

The "key" to each of my 'collections" is "THE EXHIBIT"! The first item in my quest for any of my collections is to set up an imaginary exhibit plan for the collection and then fill-in the "blank spaces" in the exhibit; much the same way as a collector fills-in the "holes" in an album. In the case of this currency collection, I gave my "want list" this heading for the title of the exhibit:

THE BROAD DIVERSITY IN COLLECTING U.S. FEDERAL & NATIONAL CURRENCY INCLUDING: SOME BEGINNINGS & ENDINGS; SOME MILESTONES & MISTAKES

The "beginnings" were the serial number one notes; the "endings", the serial number solid nine's or 1000000's ; the "milestones", the other fancy serial number notes (radar's, repeaters, solids, ladders, etc.), and the "mistakes", the error notes. The assemblage for this daunting task started by trading a lot (but not all) of the lower grade notes that my father earlier had provided for me (as "face value exchanges" for current circulating notes), for notes that were needed for the exhibit. Then during the time I was concentrating on my 1796 exhibit collection, I would bid on auction notes that were what I considered either good opportunities or "get it now, or forget it". This plan proved successful during the intervening years of the 60's through the 90's when certain notes became available that had been "off the market" for years and not likely to reappear in time for completion of my exhibit plan.

Most serial number one notes that were in this category got my attention such as the series 1875 Legal Tender serial number A-1 set that started with the $1 & $2 serial number A-1 notes in a 1990 Stack's sale that were a hard fight to get; not that the rest of the set was easy, but it wouldn't have been a "set" without these first two notes from the Stack's sale; the same situation occurred for the $20 serial number E-1 Manning note which was also part of that auction. Ten years later the rest of the notes for these two sets became a harder fight to win; but NOW THEY ARE ALL TOGETHER FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE THEY LEFT THE BEP. As opportunities arose, I made it my business to be there to try to continue to fill exhibit "blanks", or to expand the plan, in the case of an unusual opportunity that I hadn't considered likely to achieve, that had just become a possibility. The exhibit material was being acquired as well as could be expected; "patience and fortitude" is always the hallmark of my quest. The folks at Stack's Numismatics were most helpful in securing by private treaty, various notes that were needed to fill certain blanks in the exhibit with Tom Panichella acting as my agent in bidding for notes at auctions, other than their own, in my behalf when I couldn't attend.

However, my concentration was mostly on exhibiting large size notes as they were the most artistic and would make a more interesting exhibit. That all changed when I had the very good fortune to read an advertisement in a 1999 COIN WORLD issue placed by Mike Abramson displaying a $5 "Chief" note with serial number B-1, with a comment that he was a specialist in fancy serial number notes. This fortuitous moment made this collection what it is today! Mike indeed still had the B-1 note for sale and he also had the 1890 $1 serial A-1 treasury note for sale; both of which I immediately purchased. Mike then sent me his latest catalog which was a treasure trove of fancy serial numbered notes both large size and small; this, I mused, was the answer to where those small size fancy serial number notes like those I viewed at the Chase Bank exhibit 60 years ago were all "hiding". The vast majority of which I call my "mini-sets" and "maxi-sets" in this collection are a direct result of Mike's ability to secure these fancy serial number notes in reasonable enough quantities for collectors to perceive the possibility of completing sets of this magnitude in one's lifetime!

Early on in our relationship, Mike introduced me to Fred Bart, suggesting that Fred also deals in fancy serial numbered notes as well as having a good stock of National Bank Notes with fancy serial numbers and that Fred is "THE SOURCE" for my "mistakes" section of my exhibit. I thought that I had already filled in most of the "blanks" in the "mistakes" section of the exhibit, but was open to suggestions. Fred suggested some "blanks" that I hadn't considered, in trying to secure some of the mismatched serial numbered National Bank Notes, a project that realized three of the five examples known, plus some really impressive multiple-error, error notes. Fred also helped me secure, either by being my agent at auction or by private treaty, the majority of my later serial number one NBN acquisitions for the collection as well as many of the other notes that Fred bid as my agent in many of the currency auctions for the last four years.

Finally, in early 2002, I felt that the collection was now worthy for a first time exhibit at the ANA convention to be held in New York City. That was the good news; the bad news was that the original plan for the exhibit had grown out of proportion to the space available for exhibits in the small space accorded for exhibits at the Marriott Hotel venue in New York. I had exhibited my 1796 coin collection in that same venue at the ANA convention in 1997 and I knew that space would be tight. On the slim chance that additional space would be available, I had requested that I be allowed some additional cases more than the seven allowed for the exhibit; since my exhibit was entered in the (Class 2 - US Federal Currency) "competitive" category, it was deemed to be unfair for me to be given any extra cases. C'est la vie! It was a real struggle for me to eliminate so many great notes from the exhibit and a pain to have to eliminate many different series of notes in their entirety just to try to keep a "complete" collection presentation. Never the less, the exhibit won both the FIRST PLACE award in its class and also "THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD", an award voted for, independently by the visitors, not the exhibit judges, for their favorite exhibit (either competitive or non-competitive).

Joseph E. Boling, the Chief Judge, commented to me that there were too many notes in the exhibit and it seemed too "crowded"; I replied that I wished I had more cases, but understood the rules about the number of cases allowed for competitive exhibits. Joe suggested that the next time I exhibit, I should exhibit non-competitively; that could allow the use of more cases than the maximum permitted for competitive exhibits. I had just won the First Place award so I felt that it wouldn't be fair to other prospective currency exhibitors to exhibit the same material again competitively the next year. I discussed Joe's idea with other members of the exhibit committee and they concurred and suggested that I correspond with the exhibit chair for the 2003 ANA convention to be held in Baltimore about the availability of extra cases. I then started to do new design layouts for the collection exhibit, keeping in mind Joe Boling's comment about "overcrowding", to see how many extra cases I would need to display the entire collection.

The new exhibit design immediately expanded to 32 cases just for the large size notes and error notes, leaving no room for the small size note "mini" & "maxi" sets and at least half of the National Bank Notes. Then John Wilson, then the current president of the ANA and now an ANA Governor, contacted me to inquire as to how many cases I would need to exhibit the entire collection. I said that I thought that 43 cases would be enough to "do justice" to a virtually complete display of the major type design currency notes issued by the Federal Government from 1812 through 2000. John, who is also a long time currency collector and exhibitor, responded that the ANA's Exhibit Coordinator, Barbara Olson, would do her best to try to accommodate the complete 43 case exhibit as it would be nice to have a chance for the ANA to give currency more "coverage" since the ANA convention has been sometimes thought of as mainly a "coin show". However, this 43 case "approval" was contingent upon the space availability after the exhibit applications filing deadline was past and approvals for those applications were accepted.

This gave me less than six months to finish the designs, prepare the individual case descriptions, build each case's storyboard and finalize the exhibit. I gave little thought about the time it would take me to place 43 cases of material other than to give an estimate of 15 minutes per case, which would mean the exhibit could be setup in about 10 hours; theoretically, the ANA published setup schedule provided a maximum of 13 hours time to do it. My special thanks to Harvey Stack, not only a fine numismatist and dealer, but a friend as well; Stack's took care of shipping the my currency notes along with Stack's own bourse stock material by Brink's, to and from the Baltimore Convention Center, which would solve the considerable security problem of shipping an estimated $5 million worth of collectable currency in and out of the bank vault, to and from Baltimore.

Then on Tuesday, July 30, 2003, the time came for setting up the exhibit; the schedule for setup could begin between 9 AM and 7 PM and all exhibits had to be in place by 11 AM Wednesday. That's of course if you can get your cases unlocked at 9 AM; mine didn't get unlocked until noon because the many other exhibitors needed their cases unlocked and as competitive exhibitors, they had preference; three precious hours lost. Not to worry, plenty of glass to clean in the meantime and storyboards to unpack and layout, plus plenty of help, thanks to my wife Joan. The tough job was getting each of a total of 1,424 notes aligned perfectly in their respective cases. The bottom line? My 15 minute per case estimate was a bit off and we had lost three hours to boot. We just made it a tad after 11 AM on Wednesday; the last case was being locked and sealed by the ANA exhibit staff as the crowd was pouring into the convention hall. Bryce F. Doxzon, The ANA Exhibits Chair and his Assistant, Gerald L. Kochel, did a fine job of helping all the exhibitors, and did their best to make my effort less stressful as it could have been. It's a good thing I didn't request 50 cases to "spread out the notes a bit more"; I would have never made it in time. The interesting part was that the 43 cases represented only about 80% of the collection and more notes have been added to the collection since the exhibit last year.

Then came the best part; for the next four days I had the unique opportunity to talk about the fun and challenges of currency collecting to the many visitors, collectors, dealers and currency experts, not the least of which was Director of the BEP, Thomas Ferguson and Dawn R, Haley, Chief of External Relations of the BEP, who stopped by with John Wilson, ANA President, to view my exhibit. This is the part that makes putting collections together for exhibition worthwhile and the reason I build these collections. My Baltimore exhibit received THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD; truly it's the crowning glory for an exhibitor to have the visitors consider his exhibit to be their favorite! A total of two First Place awards and two People's Choice Awards were received for my ANA coin exhibits in 1985, 1993, 1996, & 1997 and one First Place and two People's Choice Awards for my currency exhibits in 2002 & 2003. To exhibit and have the opportunity to and live and breathe numismatics with other collectors and would be collectors while one is attending his own exhibit, is what it's all about for me.

My quest, started over 60 years ago while viewing the Chase Bank's currency exhibit, to be able to somehow try to duplicate that exhibit, has now come "full circle" to completion; I hope Farran Zerbe would have approved. Many hundreds of collectors and visitors have had the opportunity to see a "not too shabby" collection of U.S. Federal currency at two great venues, the ANA conventions in New York City in 2002 and in Baltimore in 2003. As it was for my exhibits of the "Coins of 1796", after the exhibiting has been completed and the collection is as good as it can reasonably be, the next step is to "memorialize" and document the collection as a future reference, for subsequent collectors to use in their quests in collecting these gems of numismatic material and then give the next collectors the chance to the owners. I have been given a wonderful and challenging opportunity to be a "steward" of these notes for a while; now, given the fact that the collection is too large for future exhibiting, it's time for other collectors to have the same opportunity for themselves.

—John Whitney

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