The FUN Show has passed and it was busier than normal. We handed out close to 100 flyers and applications to interested parties and had a larger than normal attendance at the Club meeting. Years ago our general meetings consisted of mostly just the officers and 5 or 6 guests. Now it is good to see 20 or so members and guests in attendance. We opened our meeting by meeting those in attendance. They are as listed below:

Rick Snow, Past President of the Club from Eagle Eye Rare Coins in Tucson, Arizona.
Ron Sirna, a long time member with a passion for patterns.
Tim Larson, a researcher from Washington State. Tim is currently keeper of “How Many are There, Anyways?”
Bob Pedolsky, a collector who has re-discovered his love of Indian cents from North Carolina. Bob brought a small group of counterfeit Indian cents he had purchased 30 years ago in the New York City area.
Don Haley, recipient of the Jim Johnson Literary Award.
Jerry Sajbel, a longtime member from South Carolina.
Steve Cutinsky, a guest, but I didn’t catch what state he was from.
Chris Pilliod, current President from Pennsylvania.
George Fitzgerald, an old collector friend of mine from Fort Wayne, Indiana. George has a high-grade 1802 Half dime in his collection—try finding one of these.
Bob Stanzy of North Carolina.
Ken Hill, error and variety enthusiast from Seattle. Ken collects old “safe banks” and you can find him bidding on these on eBay as well as coins.
Terry Branson of Florida.
Brian Wagner of Seattle. It was good to see Brian back in the hobby again and he is back dealing under the name of “Brian Wagner Rare Coins”.
Larry Steve, Past president from Maryland. Larry just bought a gorgeous house in the woods north of Baltimore.
Keith Meyer, Vern Sebby and Clayton Haggeman, a veteran trio from Illinois that caravans together seeking out nice Indian cents. It’s always good to see Keith and Clay--- Vern is the secretary and I hear enough from him.
Glen Marhefka, a veteran collector from Cleveland with a sharp eye.
Don Rhodes of Tennessee, Don got rid of his old orange Tennessee hat for a new orange Tennessee hat (but his hair is still gray). He’ll be glad to know that Ross, my 7-year old son, can play “Rocky Top” on the piano.
Lynn Ourso of Louisiana. Lynn is one of the nicest guys you’ll meet in any walk of life.
Robert Conrad of Oley, Pennsylvania. Bob loves early US coinage and is quite knowledgeable in the Bust series. Ask him about the turkey he won at our local Coin Club meeting last Christmas… it’s a very funny story.
Paul Gilkes of Coin World. Paul not only writes about coins but has a passion for “Mayberry” trivia and travels to reunions to meet the old actors and actresses from the show.
JT Stanton of Cherrypicker’s fame. JT looked good and is trying to wrap up the 2nd volume of Cherrypicker’s.

We also presented the Jim Johnson Literary Award. The winner for 2002 was Don Haley for his piece on how hunting in the Everglades provided the genesis for his numismatic career (he no longer hunts in the Everglades). Look for ballots in this issue for the 2003 articles in contention. Also at the FUN meeting, I gave a presentation dealing with double-struck Indian cents and why a very small percentage of the genuine examples have a very weak second strike. And wouldn’t you guess it… but about a month after the Show I received an email from a gentleman who got my name from the NGC message board and who obtained a beautiful example of a piece mixed in a “junk lot” of loose circulated Indian cents being auctioned off.

My office is situated in the corner of the East Shore Remelt Control Room here at Carpenter Technology-- our plant is split in half by the Schuykill River as it winds through Reading, Pennsylvania. The Control Room consists of a bank of computer systems controlling and monitoring the melting progress of 10 separate furnaces. Each melt is called an ingot weighing on average about 7000 lbs. One ingot requires about 12 hours of time. We produce a wide range of alloys designated for a large spectrum of applications, including aerospace turbine components, biomedical components such as heart stents, knee and hip replacements, all the way down to automotive parts such as valves and fuel injectors. Nearly every day tours come through—groups consisting of customers, prospective and new employees, school groups, even Board of Director members. We get so many visitors I don’t even bother to look any more. But one day last week as I was walking to the water fountain I passed another metallurgist giving a tour to a single customer.