Road Report

Prologue:

In a Savannah-Baltimore turnaround even the most frequent of travelers would consider to be simply too fast, Team CRO was nevertheless back on the road on Tuesday AM for the quick trip to the Inner Harbor.

But not without a couple of hairy moments, with a crummy weather forecast in Boston nearly derailing our departure, the pilot doing his level best to scare the crap out of us with his urgent turbulence warnings and our eventual landing in a thick fog in which you couldn’t actually see the ground until you were already on it.

But we made it, and then zoomed to our hotel like lightning, checked out the groovy in-room wall art (some of which is featured in the image above), sorted our bags, whipped over to the convention center, took about 20 minutes to find the security room, and then made a bee line to PCGS to turn in in our various show grading as early as possible so we would have a chance to get at least some of it back in time to offer at the show.

After which we intended to view lots at Stack’s-Bowers, but unfortunately we walked in just as they were closing up shop, so we instead headed over to the Monaco Hotel to meet some dealer friends and then eventually all migrated up the street to The Helmand, a fantastic Afghan restaurant here in town that we try to visit every time we come down here.

Then returned to the hotel so we could carefully plan our lot viewing strategy for Wednesday, organize some wholesale activity and generally get ready for what we expect to be, based on the last few weeks, a Baltimore numismatic avalanche of utterly epic proportions.

During which we will blog all about all of it right here in this space every single morning of the show.

Starting tomorrow.

March 4th: Day 1

Team CRO was up and out early on Wednesday as we made the long schlepp from our hotel to the convention center in raw, cold weather so we could arrive in the dealer trading rooms before all the good stuff was gone.

But before we could even walk in the door, another dealer stopped us in our tracks by shouting those magic words “Hey, I have some coins that may be for you” right there in the hallway. And in this case they were absolutely right, allowing us to snap up two pieces of choice early gold which will look amazing on an upcoming EB, or in a bourse case like here at the Whitman show.

After which we headed into the room and found another 15 cool, interesting, mostly old holdered US coins of all kinds.

And then migrated on to Stack’s-Bowers lot viewing where we pored through 3 catalogs full of medals, tokens, colonials and US coins, finding more to bid on than I had anticipated based on my pre-show, online perusal. Also interesting, the lot viewing assistant there told me that I had (and I quote) “beautiful hair”, the first time anyone other than my wife has said to me since I had that Flock of Seagulls do in the mid 1980s:

So that was exciting.

Anyway, after we finished viewing, we figured to take a look though other dealers’ coins in the hallway, and there were ample opportunities to do so as literally every single table was occupied by dealers rifling through boxes of coins of all sorts. And so we joined in, finding more than our fair share of interesting items from usual and new sources, buying some outright, and splitting others with like-minded dealers.

Which continued on right up until lunch, when we headed over to the Pratt Street Ale House, a restaurant we have not visited in recent years since it is not that close to the usual show location near the Charles Street entrance of the convention center. But this year, for the first time in a decade or more, the show is near the Pratt Street entrance, opening up some new options for us.

And then we returned, viewed more coins with increasingly fewer ‘hits’ and eventually started getting ready for the 4 PM start of dealer set up.  First by getting our bags out of security, and then joining the long queue of dealers at the top of the escalators, and then nearly being crushed when one guy’s DIY cart came apart at the bottom almost causing a cavalcade of dealers (including us) to come crashing down on him.  Fortunately, with the help of some other guys, they hauled him out of the way with seconds to spare, and we all made it to the show entrance unscathed.

Then raced to our well-located table 935, sorted out the cases and lights situation and had ourselves up and running in about 10 minutes, just as some guy vest pocket by walked by and muttered “Everyone is so slow setting up”. Hey, we’re doing the best we can here.

Which turned out to be good enough to sell a bunch of coins and medals to three different people, zip around the floor looking for other cool coins, do some bookkeeping with dealer partners and generally be super productive, working even though the free pizza, beer and wine provided by Whitman since we of course we did not want to spoil our dinner.

And that was a good decision, since we were going to Cinghiale with some dealer friends as we do on Wednesday at pretty much every Baltimore show. Which turned out to be excellent as always, though always kind of a marathon, so we were delighted to finish before the staff started vacuuming the floor as has happened in the past.

Allowing us to get back to our hotel at a reasonably civilized hour and get some rest before we head back on Thursday for more lot viewing followed by a full day on the bourse floor during which the public will be coming in, and with them some pre-arranged meetings to deliver coins we agreed to buy last week, and, very likely, all kinds of other buying and selling we can’t possibly predict.

Whatever it turns out to be, and whatever additional comments are made about my hair, we’ll blog all about all of it right here on Friday AM –

March 5th: Day 2

We’re really enjoying our hotel here in Baltimore, other than the fact that the elevators (which are not that close to our room) are super loud and even from a great distance sound kind of like a space shuttle launch every 30 seconds or so.

With these frequent rides undoubtedly due to the gazillion attendees of the AWP (Association of Writers and Writing Programs) Convention in town who have pretty much taken over every hotel (and hotel elevator), restaurant, Uber and taxi in the entire metropolitan area. A situation I can’t recall to this degree since the massive TED conference took over Long Beach during the February 2009 Expo.

So instead of waiting 22 minutes for an Uber, and fighting through traffic, we decided to walk to the convention center on a brisk morning. And while that was generally just fine, I really wish I was not hauling my auction catalogs with me at the time, since my brief case weighed about 27 pounds and was akin to carrying your oversized golf bag a mile and a half through city streets. Honestly, it did not help when MaryAnn cheerfully announced that “This walking was a great idea!”. No, no it wasn’t. To be fair, she did offer to carry my bag at one point, but I did not want to arrive at the convention center looking like Lord Fauntleroy with a Sherpa in tow.

We got their eventually, though, at which time I schlepped said catalogs to the lot viewing room and re-reviewed about 100 lots of particular interest that I had flagged on Wednesday. Finishing just in time to race down to the bourse floor for the 10 AM start of the show, and immediately roll into a bunch of transactions.

Selling coins in all categories, and in a wide range of price points, including a number of brand new items which we introduced here, and a few old friends that have been with us for the last several shows. Three more pieces of colonial currency included.

Since we needed to replenish the website, we were in buying mode throughout, including a bunch of neatly toned world coins we sold to a collector a number of years ago and bought back here. And then upped our game considerably when we split a highfalutin gold deal late in the afternoon.

So by the time that was over, we had something like 65 NEWPs in the back case, many of which will be off to photography straight away, while others wend their way through the grading and CACing process.

And then suddenly it was time to pack up and head out where we immediately encountered the same issue trying to find an Uber or a cab, so we walked to a nearby hotel and had a drink in the bar where a collector friend showed me his recent CRO hat photos, one of which I added to the Hat Attack section of our site right then and there.

Then eventually headed off to The Black Olive in Fell’s Point for an another excellent dinner here before walking back to our hotel, standing in another elevator queue, finally getting back to our room on the late side, and collapsing in a Grade-A heap.

And of course we’ll be ready to do it all again on Friday, with, we hope, even more collector activity at the table, and the possibility of more wheeling and dealing of all shapes and sizes.

EOM

March 6th: Day 3

The Top 10 Things That Happened on Friday in Baltimore

We walked to the show in the AM and your author was NOT shlepping all his catalogs with him, which was an absolute delight, and a huuuuge improvement from yesterday.

We had great interactions here with relatively young numismatists Tyler Jorgenson and Curt Gammer, who are wise beyond their years and great guys to work with.

We bought an early gold deal which could be described as wicked (in a good way).

Yay to another Caesar salad for lunch.

Dealer extraordinaire and friend of the firm Tony Terranova recommended the book Letters from America by William Eddis (signatory on the Maryland $6 note listed on this very website). The book contains letters written by the author to his parents back home in England between 1769 and 1777 providing valuable insights into daily life, political tensions, and travel throughout the colonies during that period.

On a sorta related note, we sold a bunch of colonial currency here on Friday.

I bought a group of old holdered toned Morgans that were NOT megabucks, which is the way I always hope to find them.

We got the last of our show grading back in the afternoon concluding an excellent run of crossovers at PCGS here. That was most welcome, as even coins that we think are 100% deserving don’t always work the first time (or ever, actually).

We bought a neatly toned Pegasus ancient coin at about 5:50 PM from a dealer who had been right next to us the entire show.

We had an absolutely fantastic dinner at Blue Agave in Federal Hill, which was partly helped by me now knowing what to order there. Even better, I realized I left my wallet on the table, and went back and grabbed it BEFORE we jumped in the Uber and thus avoided what numismatists call a very unfortunate situation.

I wish I could say that we then went back to the hotel and got a good night’s sleep, but the 12 people (my estimate based on the variety of voices) partying in the next room until 2:20 AM made that impossible. Sure, I could have called the front desk and had security come up and tell them to cut it out, but I prefer to handle these sorts of things in a more mature way (i.e. by getting up at my usual 4:40 AM, blasting the TV and making as much noise as possible).

I’ll let you know how that works out and also describe all of Saturday’s numismatic activities in our final Baltimore RR to be posted from home on Sunday AM.

Until then, then –

March 7th: Day 4

On a getaway Saturday, we availed ourselves of the fine breakfast buffet at the hotel, then packed up, checked out and enjoyed schlepping our luggage to the convention center.

Arriving just in time to submit some last, late take-home grading and stickering before the services stopped accepting them.

After which we zipped around the room to check out a few coins, clean up loose ends, collect a couple checks and write one more of our own.

Then met up with a succession (but not a real steady succession) of visitors to the table, including the typical weekend novices with modern error coins (which almost invariably look like post mint damage to me), but also a couple of surprisingly advanced collectors looking at high end US type and Latin American silver.

And while we did talk coins with that latter group, and hand out a bunch of cards, we managed to sell just one coin on Saturday, which was disappointing but not surprising since by then most of the room had cleared out.

So eventually we decided it was time for us to go too, heading to the airport in the mid-afternoon with some dealer friends, finding the one restaurant with room for us, fighting through the crowds of kids on school vacation week and finally flying home on a completely jam-packed, not very comfortable flight.

Getting home pretty late and then, as is usually the case, collapsing in a heap after another long day, which concluded a couple of weeks on the road for us.

The good news is that we’ll be here for a while, as our next 2 shows are of the local variety, and we will not be on another airplane until CSNS at the end of April. So we’ll have some time to rest. Not for for very long though, as we’ll now need to start working on a special New Jersey Copper Mini EB which will go out this Tuesday, and then a highfalutin, full blown, no holds barred EB one week later.

So you might want to keep an eye out for both of those –