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At the heart of Littleton, Thayer’s Inn as it appeared at the turn of the last century. Note the unpaved streets and the horse and buggy carrying guests to their destinations.
For many years, I’ve collected 19th and early 20th century books, engravings, stereoviews, photos, and maps of the New Hampshire White Mountains where I live. While reading my copy of Chisholm’s White Mountain Guide-Book published in 1880,
I found this reference to Littleton…
LITTLETON.
A bright little village, stretching along the Ammonoosuc, and slowly climbing the hills to the north, with the usual variety of quaint country stores, the usual group of small wooden churches, and the usual bank and weekly newspaper, — so Littleton appears to the casual visitor, who, if his turn of mind is practical, will see also a line of small factories along the rushing stream. It is indeed the most prosperous village in Northern New Hampshire, and might have been one of its great summer capitals if the pioneers of the last century [18th] had not changed its name of Chiswick to the name which it now bears. It is impossible for romantic or aesthetic emotions to be aroused by the word Littleton, which comes very near to being the culmination of the commonplace.
The writer goes on in a more complimentary tone…
There are beautiful prospects from the hills in this vicinity;…the vast panorama of mountains includes the Presidential peaks and the Franconia Range.…So, in spite of its name and its enterprise, Littleton is yearly becoming more and more a favorite point with scenery-hunters. Near the centre of the village is that famous old inn, Thayer’s White-Mountain Hotel, whose Sunday dinners are famous in all northern New England.
In the year 2004, 124 years later, Thayer’s Hotel still stands, and Littleton is still a “bright little village.” Last May, Littleton was one of 5 communities in the U.S. to win the “Great American Main Street Award” sponsored by Osram Sylvania.
Littleton’s Main Street has been working for several years with The National Trust for Historic Preservation’s National Main Street Center, headquartered in Washington, D.C., to revitalize our downtown – with great results, which you will see if you visit us. To check out Littleton, visit the website www.golittleton.com
Just think, if the original settlers had not changed the name from Chiswick to Littleton, we’d probably be known as Chiswick Coin Company.
At the heart of Littleton, Thayer’s Inn as it appeared at the turn of the last century. Note the unpaved streets and the horse and buggy carrying guests to their destinations. |
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Old postcards are always interesting, especially when they are from your hometown. While the Methodist Church still stands proudly on Main Street, everything else shown here is gone. This Littleton landmark, the Northern Hotel, burned in 1924.
You can see the Premier Theatre in the center, and at the far left, the sign urging patrons of Israel C. Richardson's Horse and Auto Livery to "Engage your seats by automobile for the St. Johnsbury Fair, Sept 10-11-12. Only $2.00 the Round Trip." The St. Johnsbury fair was held in nearby St. Johnsbury, Vermont. Imagine spending two days pay - which is roughly what $2.00 represented in 1909 for the average Littleton worker - on a 30-mile automobile ride! Of course, in 1909, the automobile was a novelty in northern New Hampshire, and no doubt expensive to operate. Roads were pretty rough and muddy, too. Today's Littleton - St. Johnsbury trip takes 25 minutes each way on scenic Interstate 93. I imagine Dave's Taxi, Littleton's present-day "auto livery" service (no, despite the name, it's not mine) would do the trip pretty inexpensively. |
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A gentleman from Pennsylvania writes:
Why is your address so long? I imagine your place as a dingy, dark room over an abandoned grocery store, with one pull chain light bulb. What do I know? I just love New Hampshire and wish I could live there.
The nice thing is that we really have a wonderful building to work with, and a wonderful, caring staff. While most of us are fortunate to live and work in New Hampshire, we also draw a contingent of staff from nearby beautiful Vermont - just 5 miles away.
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Thanks to Richard Zura of Ohio for the postcards of Gibraltar Island, on Lake Erie. Jay Cooke, the famous Civil War financier, owned the island at one time, and had a castle retreat built on it. Mr. Zura bought one of the Jay Cooke checks for Put-in-Bay, Ohio's new museum.
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 With the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics not far away, this numismatic treasure from circa 400 B.C., presented to an ancient Greek Olympic Games winner 2,400 years ago, recalls how old and revered organized sport is, and the cultural roots of the Greek games. This famous coin was struck in Syracuse, the Greek city on the isle of Sicily. The dies were engraved by the master die maker, or celator, Kimon. The obverse depicts a chariot at full gallop, with the goddess Nike flying above, crowning the driver with a wreath of Victory. The Greek letters ATHLA (origin of the word Athlete) name the military harness, shield, helmet, etc. depicted as the prize for the victor of the race. The reverse shows the nymph Arethusa in superb classical style. This coin was worth ten Drachms, a large amount of money, and is extremely large. This example is pedigreed in famous collections to 1914, and is the plate coin featured on the front of two books on Greek coinage. It is currently for sale by the owner at $37,000. There are also two more Decadrachms, one at $17,000 and one at $27,000.
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 Nearly 150 years ago, shortly after its historic battle with the Confederate ironclad, C.S.S. Virginia, the Union ironclad submarine U.S.S. Monitor sank on December 31, 1862, just 16 miles off Cape Hatteras, N.C. Rediscovered in the 1970s, the wreck site is the nation's first National Marine Sanctuary. Now, time and the sea are taking her apart. To rescue what remains before the sea destroys her, teams of divers are now moored over the wreck site, retrieving major portions of the wreck for permanent display ashore. On August 8th, the steam engine recovered from the wreckage of the Civil War ironclad U.S.S. Monitor arrived at the Mariners' Museum for preservation and eventual display. More than 140 artifacts from the ship were brought up by divers this summer, ranging from a piece of a shoe sole to the engine. Many of the items already are being conserved at the museum and are on display. For coin collectors, this first Union ironclad is forever commemorated on several different U.S. Civil War tokens shown here. For more info see: www.monitorcenter.org |
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 When I traveled with my family to Japan last February, we all learned that gold is a taste sensation in the city of Kanazawa! I did not eat sushi once, but my family and I did have tea with gold flakes sprinkled on it, which dissolved instantly, and I saved this candy as a souvenir of the gold leaf shop we visited. Nearly 99% of all the gold leaf in Japan is produced in the city of Kanazawa, and you can see they are always inventing uses for it! Kanazawa is a charming city on the western coast, dating from 1546, with many surviving old buildings, and was a favorite of mine on the trip. |
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| An expansion of the paper currency printing facilities of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing has just been completed. This increased capacity will facilitate a more rapid changeover to newly designed American paper money when it is required, which some say is coming soon. Some experts are predicting we may even see the use of multiple colors, as most other nations enjoy – wouldn’t that be a change for Americans! The last change in our paper currency took nearly five years to effect. Look for the next change to occur in less than half the time. |
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| Why some U.S. Silver Dollar mintage figures do not represent rarity: During World War I, the U.S. government melted and sold 350,000,000 silver dollars to the English as silver bullion. Today’s silver dollar collectors will never know which dates were melted, as exact records were not kept. |
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 USA Today reported 7/26/2001 that the 12 European Community countries switching January 1, 2002 to the new Euro will receive 50 billion coins and 14.5 billion notes to start! No monetary change has ever been made on such a scale. All the current coins and notes will become obsolete and lose their purchasing power by the end of April, 2002. This deadline has put pressure on Europe's black market to "clean" its money before it becomes unusable. Some experts believe this cash economy was behind the most recent surge in the value of the U.S. dollar relative to the Euro, as the underground economy puts this currency into dollars. The theory makes sense on the face of it. Although the Euro seems to be on the rise lately, the strong dollar of the past year has been evident to any U.S. citizen traveling in Europe, and has made most anything imported from Europe 10-25% cheaper than a year ago. As a collector, this presents opportunities for you. Littleton Coin has been able to buy some very attractive coins and bank notes in Europe at most reasonable prices, which we can offer to you. |
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| On offer in Baltimore is a new exhibition entitled Antioch: The Lost Ancient City, at the Baltimore Museum of Art. This features about a hundred examples of mosaics, sculptures, frescoes, metalwork, pottery and COINS. You should visit this if you are in the area. The Roman city of Antioch was abandoned in A.D. 546, following a devastating earthquake. It is most familiar to moderns from the writings of Paul. Collectors who admire ancient coins have many coins from Antioch to choose from. See them in Baltimore, in context with the civilization to which they belonged. |
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Of miners bringing gold back east from California, Jacob R. Eckfeldt and William E. Dubois, assayers of the U.S. Mint, writing in 1851 in New Varieties of Gold and Silver Coins, Counterfeit Coins, and Bullion, stated that “The advantage of having gold grains or dust cast into bars, as a preparative for exportation, is perhaps overrated…A good tin box, well soldered, will hold fast and keep dry; and the mint charges nothing for melting…” (In 1851, returning Californian gold miners would head for the New Orleans or Philadelphia Mints, as the miners shown below.)... “This is the most general kind of packing now used, but the tin case, if large, requires to be enclosed in a wooden box, and after that there is need of a vigilant watch and care. A most daring theft was lately committed, somewhere on the route, by boring through box and case; and about $9,000 worth was abstracted.” Whether it was fear of similar thefts, or convenience, by 1857, the packing methods of the returning miners for raw gold had changed. The San Francisco Mint had opened in 1856, facilitating coinage of $20 gold pieces, and much of the gold found on the wreck of the S.S. Central America was in coin and bar form, although ample quantities of raw nuggets and dust also were retrieved.
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 Henry Voight: Early American Coin Designer and Steamboat Patent Holder. The dies to create the shown coin have been attributed to the Mint's first chief coiner, Henry Voight. These are the first coins produced for circulation by the United States Mint in Philadelphia. Henry Voight was appointed First Chief Coiner of the U.S. Mint in January 1793. I was surprised to learn he was quite an inventor. He and John Fitch had a patent on an early steamboat - all this prior to Robert Fulton. It was John Fitch who successfully navigated the first vessel ever moved by steam on the Delaware River at Philadelphia, on July 20, 1786. The following year, on August 22, 1787, a steamboat forty-five feet long again navigated at Philadelphia, in the presence of the delegates to form a Constitution of the United States, and again by John Fitch, with the assistance of Henry Voight. In 1792, Voight had sought the Mint position to aid his finances while he worked on a steamboat with John Fitch. According to the 1857 book by Thompson Westcott, The Life of John Fitch THE Inventor of the Steamboat:
Fitch and Voight both made application for situations in the Mint of the United States; hoping that whilst they held those offices they would have time to perfect the steam-boat. In their petition it was stated, “John Fitch is a goldsmith by trade, and flatters himself that he could render essential service to his country as assay-master. Henry Voight is perfectly acquainted with the process of coining, and of all machinery for the business, and can make the instruments himself, having worked at it in Germany for several years.” Dr. Ewing, David Rittenhouse, Andrew Ellicott, and Dr. Patterson recommended the appointment of the pair to the posts they desired. The result was that Voight was successful, having been appointed Chief Coiner; a position he held for many years. But Fitch, unlucky as usual, did not gain the prize.
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In addition to being honored by the Old Man of the Mountain appearing on the ninth state quarter in the 50 State Quarters Program in September 2000, New Hampshire's Franconia Notch State Park received a special award from the American Society of Landscape Architects on October 14th. The Centennial Medallion Award was presented to the park for foresight to preserve the unique mountain passage, the Old Man profile, the Basin, the Flume Gorge and the path and highway circulation systems, and the many opportunities available to visitors for exploration and education.
More than a million visitors a year come to Franconia Notch State Park, from all over the U.S. and the world. When you come to visit us in Littleton, you will have to go through this "home to the Old Man," just 12 miles from our offices.
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 It seems the booming Irish economy has caused a shortage of coins. It's estimated that up to half the coinage in Ireland has disappeared into jam jars and piggy banks, according to a recent article in London's Financial Times. There's a particular shortage of 1 penny, 2 pence and 5 pence coins, which is affecting retailers' ability to give change. A contributing factor is that tourists always take six or seven coins with them, and tourism is up. Bankers have made an appeal to the Irish public to turn in those jam jars and piggy banks. There are currently 633 coins per person in Ireland, with half unaccounted for. Not mentioned in the article is the activity of coin collectors. All these coins disappear permanently in January 2002 with the new Irish version of the Euro coinage.
Imagine the confusion in the U.S. if we had to convert all our coins and bank notes to new ones in a two-month changeover. This is exactly what will be happening in 12 European countries in about a year.
With fewer than 300 days to the introduction of euro notes and coins, a major worry for those who live in the 12 European community countries adopting the new euro has to be the wildly fluctuating value of the euro versus the U.S. dollar. Since its creation two years ago, and the fixing of exchange rates of the 12 adopting countries, the euro has ranged in value from a high of $1.17 when first introduced, to a low of 84 cents in September. Today it is worth about $1.08 in U.S. dollars.
While the generally lower value of the euro versus the dollar in the past 2 years has been great for U.S. tourists traveling in Europe or buying European automobiles, it has been a disaster for those European countries who must import Mideast oil priced in U.S. dollars. As expensive as oil is in the U.S., the increase in oil prices has been more acute in Europe due to this currency weakness.
This year's euro "countdown" will be interesting to watch. Further surprises are likely before January 1, 2002. From a coin and currency collector's viewpoint, it will also be most interesting.
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 Speaking of errors, I purchased a 2000 New Hampshire quarter - clad layer missing - for our company's exhibit of New Hampshire Statehood quarters here in Littleton.
While touring our packaging room the other day, one of our eagle-eyed employees said "Dave, look at this!" and held up - you guessed it - a New Hampshire quarter - clad layer missing! Oh well - now the firm has two for our display!
It's always fun to find something valuable. Errors are one of the few things left that you still have a chance of finding in circulation. Of course, our staff has a better chance than most, handling millions of new coins every year. If you go through millions of coins, you deserve to find something! |
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