Introduction

The American Numismatic Society can justifiably claim that it has long had an interest in Canadian numismatics. The very second donation ever received by the Society, accession number 1858.2, on May 25, 1858, included a sou issued by the Banque du Peuple of Montreal, the gift of Edward Groh. In those days, interest in United States numismatics and Canadian numismatics grew hand-in-hand. This continued in the 1890s, after the formation of the American Numismatic Association. The first vice-president of the American Numismatic Association, Joseph Hooper, was a native of Ontario. R. W. McLachlan was almost invariably in attendance at ANA conventions, which were hod in Montreal twice: in 1909 and 1923. One Canadian has also served as president of the American Numismatic Association: J. Douglas Ferguson.

It is regrettable that the citizens of the respective countries have begun to concentrate on their own coinages to the exclusion of all else, and have turned away from the eclecticism of the early days. There was a good reason for that eclecticism: it reflected the circulating medium of the time. The collectors of the 1850s put together their first collections out of circulation, and a Mickley or a Groh was as likely to receive a Bank of Montreal front view token in change as a Nova Eborac. Thus even the collector who is interested exclusively in the numismatics of the United States cannot ignore the Canadian series, for in the early part of the nineteenth century it was as much a part of United States coinage as it was part of Canada's. There are some sections of the United States where this continued to be the case even after the great recoinage of 1857. Michigan is the obvious example. A rather drastic example of the predominance of Canadian coppers in circulation in Michigan is provided by the Delton, Michigan (1899) hoard. In the darkest days of the Civil War a great fear gripped the Middle West, and this is reflected in the large number of hoards buried about this time. The Delton, Michigan hoard closes in 1862 and probably was buried soon after that date, in a woodpile near the right-of-way of the Chicago, Kalamazoo & Saginaw Railroad. It consisted of 119 copper coins; of those coppers, no fewer than 93 were of Canadian origin. There were only 15 United States large cents, along with various oddities, such as one Chinese cash coin.' We should not be surprised that people would hoard copper in 1862: it had disappeared from circulation to such an extent that it had to be replaced by government issued fractional currency or privately issued scrip. The disappearing copper had to go somewhere, and it did—into hoards. The Aaron White hoard is another famous example.

The importance of Canadian numismatics for the collector interested in the United States in the early nineteenth century is very great. Counterfeiters did not suddenly disappear once the United States Mint began business. Yet we have to explain why there are so comparatively few contemporary circulating counterfeits of large cents. One answer, of course, is that some of the so-called "noncollectible large cents" may well be contemporary counterfeits: one highly educated dealer, James G. Macallister, thought the strawberry leaf cents were contemporary counterfeits, and he probably was right. But counterfeiters in the early nineteenth century had an easier option than counterfeiting large cents. They could instead counterfeit George II halfpence, which circulated almost as freely. Eric P. Newman has pointed out that what we commonly think of as "colonials" circulated in the United States up until 1857-64.(2) This means that counterfeit halfpence, whether attributed to Machin's Mills or elsewhere, illicit Connecticut coppers, all sorts of parts of the "colonial" series which do not quite fit in, may have been produced later, perhaps much later. John Lorenzo has made the very attractive suggestion that the cast New Hampshire copper with the date of 1776 might have actually been produced around the same time and by the same methods as the Canadian Blacksmith coppers.(3) The specimen in the ANS collection, which we received in 1988 as the gift of Herbert Oechsner, seems to confirm this; it has the same sort of uneven, "rice pudding-like" surface which many Canadian Blacksmith coppers do.

The United States researcher faces great problems in dating these coins. The story is told of Margaret Thompson, who, when asked to date a New Style tetradrachm, replied, "somewhere between 229 B.C. and the time of Augustus."4 The United States researcher, when asked the date of production of a George II counterfeit of North American origin, could just as easily reply, "somewhere between 1727 and 1862." The Canadian series may provide the means of dating these counterfeit coppers. Many of the Canadian tokens have nineteenth century dates; and there is great difference in the weight standards. We can follow the debasement of copper in the Canadian tokens, even if we cannot follow it in the large cents. Further metrological analysis of some of the difficult parts of the colonial series, which could then be compared to coins in the Canadian series, might help us date "colonials" more accurately.

John M. Kleeberg Conference Chairman

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1 George F. Heath, "Editorial," The Numismatist 1900, p. 62; George W. Rice, ' Editorial," The Numismatist 1900, p. 89.

2 Eric P. Newman, "American Circulation of English and Bungtown Halfpence," Eric P. Newman and Richard G. Doty, eds., Studies on Money in Early America (New York, 1976) p. 172.

3 John Lorenzo, "1776 New Hampshire Pine Tree Coinage: A Canadian Connection Fifty Years Later?" Penny-Wise 27 (1993), pp. 171-72.

4 [William E. Metcalf] "Margaret Thompson," American Numismatic Society Annual Report for the Period Ending September 30, 1992 (New York, [1993])p. 71.