Curating
Steve: Within the art world, many people with nebulous jobs and vague sources of income are either advisors or curators. Advisors presumably help a collector buy, sell and manage a collection. Curators do the same thing, but there is an assumption that a curator provides more scholarly umph, I suppose.
Some clients are seeking outside help for guidance, while others are looking for a challenge. Within the numismatic space, I’ve found that collectors are often averse to paying any fees for guidance to help build a collection; instead, working with a trusted dealer or auction house representative to help them refine their collections. This has always struck me as odd, since most collectors have no issues absorbing the cost of third-party certification by firms like Professional Coin Grading Service, Numismatic Guaranty Company. or ANACS. A handful of public numismatic museums hire staff curators to secure their collections and help contextualize them for the public.
Dennis, what do you think about the idea that numismatists are often reluctant to pay for impartial guidance as they build their collections?
Dennis: I wish I had a houseplant consultant. Even our snake plant died, and the lady at Home Depot told us it thrives on neglect. Country Living named the snake plant its 2025 Plant of the Year, saying, “You won’t kill this one!” And yet here we are. (I won’t share photos, out of respect for the departed.)
I wouldn’t pay a professional fee for a plant consultant because there are so many gardening books, online do-it-yourself videos, and helpful friends who know a lot more than I do (and are eager to share their knowledge for free). Our next-door neighbor knows all about the local environment and which plants grow well, when, and where. She could invoice us but she doesn’t, and I’m grateful for her valuable free help.
Coin collectors tend to be staunchly independent. (I almost wrote “opinionated and have a stubborn streak,” but I didn’t want to sound negative!) I think the aversion to paying professional consultants or guides comes from the way most of us start in the hobby. We enter as kids, learning from books and hobby papers (and, today, online resources). Sometimes we have an older family member, neighbor, or friend, someone who’s been in the hobby for a long time, who can act as mentor and advisor—but as a fellow hobbyist, not as a paid consultant. Books are readily available, free from the library or affordable from your favorite bookstore or coin shop. There’s a long, natural period of growth and education. Knowledge is gathered organically, over time, at your own pace, within your own means and comfort level.
If you remain at the beginner level (which is fine), of course you wouldn’t pay a consultant for advice. If you graduate over time from Wheat cents and Washington quarters to silver dollars, older type coins, gold, or other specialties, you’ve built a sense of confidence and a network of trusted fellow hobbyists.
[Image: 1883 Morgan Dollar.]
As your collecting becomes more specialized and rarefied, possibly involving bigger dollar amounts, I could see you becoming more open to hiring a consultant. Certainly at the institutional level we see nonprofits and trusts pay professionals to analyze, maintain, and curate their collections. And, as you mentioned, high-end collectors can pay dealers and auction-house reps to be their eyes and ears when needed. But in my experience, even most advanced collectors prefer to learn from other enthusiasts, fellow travelers. Done right, the hobby is about building friendships more than just transactions. That’s where specialized groups like Early American Coppers, Medal Collectors of America, the Barber Coin Collectors Society, the Society of Paper Money Collectors, and others come in. . . with no consulting fees attached!
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Hello! And welcome to the ANA’s blog series, “Collecting Friends.”
We decided to approach this much like a conversation between friends. One of us starts with a topic, then the other responds. Simple as that. Along those lines, we’ll keep the tone conversational as much as possible.
We both write about coins professionally, and will keep our relative style guides in our writing. For Dennis, former Publisher at Whitman Publishing, that means capitalizing “Proof” and italicizing Red Book and never saying anything bad about Ken Bressett, who’s awesome anyway.
For Steve, who’s written with Coin World for 15 years, it means Winged Liberty Head dime instead of “Mercury” dime, and similar nuances and oddities. And, it means writing A Guide Book of United States Coins (better known as the “Red Book”).
Both of us started collecting when we were little, introduced to coins by a chance encounter with an old coin that sparked our curiosity. One of Steve’s interests is coin valuation, and he gravitates towards the intersection of art and coins. Dennis enjoys medals and world coins, and studying modern U.S. coins in the context of older series, what came before.
We met in 2012 at the American Numismatic Association World’s Fair of Money in Philadelphia at an event hosted by the Austrian Mint where there was both a Ben Franklin and a Betsy Ross impersonator. We’ve become great friends in the past decade. We even were appointed together to sit on the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee starting in 2016, but Steve resigned soon after he was appointed to accept a full-time job at the Treasury Department while Dennis was re-appointed in 2020.
We taught a course together on numismatic publishing and writing a few years ago at the Summer Seminar, and while life has gotten in the way of us teaching another class, we jumped at our friend Caleb’s suggestion that we write a column. We hope you enjoy it!
The American Numismatic Association is a nonprofit organization dedicated to educating and encouraging people to study and collect coins and related items. The Association serves collectors, the general public, and academic communities with an interest in numismatics.
The ANA helps all people discover and explore the world of money through its vast array of educational programs including its museum, library, publications, conventions and numismatic seminars.