Michael Hodder and Q. David Bowers
A number of these Connecticut coppers are historically important. 1787 Miller 1.1-VV is inventoried as number 662. Pasted next to Mrs. Norweb's description of the piece is the front of the original envelope in which it was contained. On the envelope is written the following: "Reserved Specimen 1-1/VV. 1787. The first specimen found, bought from a lot from Steigerwalt Nov. '97. Oct. 1902 Mr. Smith found a second specimen which he donated to me. This duplicate then in cabinet exchanged for Mr. Smith's new specimen:' The handwriting is that of Dr. Thomas Hall, the pioneer cataloguer of Connecticut state copper coins, whose work was published in 1892. The coin is significant as the variety's discovery piece.
Another Connecticut state copper shares a similar distinction. Inventory number 687 records a 1787 Miller 16.6-NN.2. Beside the entry Mrs. Norweb pasted part of a letter from Dr. Hall, which discussed the variety. The surviving part of the letter now reads: "For many years I have owned the piece of this combination in my cabinet. Said piece being in [sic] too poor and miserable to warrant my attempting a description in my printed work. It was purposely omitted from the same. Oct. '93: I now find the enclosed duplicate, making only two specimens found and have written in a description in my work published in 1892."
Other Connecticut state copper coins trace their pedigrees back to Dr. Hall's collection, and some beyond that to auction sales of the 1890s and 1870s (Steigerwalt and Hays collections). The few scraps of documentation that survive from this period suggest that much more once accompanied the collection. The same observation may be made for other series in Albert Holden's collection, not only colonial era coins but federal issues as well. It is unfortunate that more was not preserved for future numismatic historians and researchers.
Between 1937, when Henry was appointed Ambassador to Bolivia, and 1940, when he was reassigned far from home, as Ambassador to Peru, the Norwebs devoted much of their available spare time to the coin collection, as well-as their other, non-numismatic interests. Once on station in Lima, Peru, their involvement with United States coins naturally grew less intense than it had been when they were closer to home, in Mexico or the Dominican Republic. However, while they were not as active with US. coins after 1940, their important collections of Latin American coins, which they had started while in Chile in 1930, received more attention.
The War Years and After (1940-1952)
Ambassador and Mrs. Norweb served in Lima, Peru from 1940 until Henry was reassigned to Lisbon, Portugal in late 1943. After completing his mission in Portugal, Ambassador Norweb was then transferred to Panama, later to Cuba, and the Norwebs did not return to the United States until late in 1948. Consequently, with more important matters to concern them, little time could be devoted to their coin collection between 1940 and 1948. After their return to their home in Bratenahl, and Henry's retirement from the Department of State in 1948, they could afford to turn their attention- to their personal interests, including their coin collection. The four years from 1948 to 1952 were spent in finishing the massive job of inventorying and cataloguing Albert Holden's collection, as well as their own substantial acquisitions, gathering a rich numismatic library for reference purposes, and getting back into touch with old friends like B. Max Mehl. Bythe early 1950s they were ready to return to their numismatic hobby, prepared to round out the collection of US. coins, and to expand their interests into other numismatic fields.
The Halcyon Years 1952-1962
By 1952 Ambassador and Mrs. Norweb had nearly finished inventorying the coins and medals in their collection, the pieces that had been part of the collection since Albert Holden's time and those they had bought during the 1930s. The inventory listing was not fully complete, as Ambassador Norweb once told a friend, even in 1954-there simply were too many individual coins to list them separately, even with the help of a full time secretary. As the years went by, from 1952 to 1957, and more coins were added to the collection, the inventory listings of new accessions grew less and less detailed, until towards the end of this period all that were .listed in the ledgers were the coin's denomination, date, country (if not US.), and vendor. These were the halcyon days of their joint collecting, and the Norwebs were acquiring coins faster than they could be inventoried. The last entry in their inventory ledgers records coin number 16,999, a Brazilian 20,000 reis of 1889-B, bought from A.H. Baldwin & Sons, Ltd. on May 4, 1957 for ninety dollars. No further entries were recorded, although we know that they were still actively collecting five years later.
A quick glance through the reconstructed inventory of Albert Holden's collection and the records of purchases made by the Norwebs themselves in the 1930s, which will be found passim, reveals that in the United States colonial and federal series most issues were present in the collection before 1952. Coins purchased after that date represented, primarily, great rarities in the federal and colonial series, such as the 1861 Philadelphia Mint Paquet double eagle or the Maryland/Lord Baltimore denarium. In addition, the Norwebs expanded certain collecting areas to include die varieties. This expansion was concentrated mainly in the field of copper coins, federal half and large cents, and colonial era issues, especially the Rosa Americana, Wood's Hibernia, and Mark Newby/St. Patrick's issues. Early in 1953 the Norwebs also began adding branch mint double eagles to their collection. This was a field Albert Holden had not made much progress in earlier. It should also be remembered that, as Albert had died in 1913, coins issued after that date were obviously not in his collection; these also had to be included by the Norwebs, so, in addition to rarities, we sometimes find the Norwebs purchasing fairly common issues, like Lincoln cents or Jefferson nickels. Like her father before her, however, Mrs. Norweb bought such easily purchased issues en bloc, completing whole series by date and mint in one transaction.
Prior to 1952 the Norwebs had purchased large numbers of coins from most of the important professional numismatists of the day. However, these transactions had all been done through the mail. As far as the surviving documents tell us, Ambassador and Mrs. Norweb had never attended an auction in person or been present at a coin convention. Their involvement in the business side of coin collecting had been superficial, simply because their own personal lives were so demanding of their time and energies. When they resumed their numismatic activities in 1952, perhaps the most difficult lesson they both had to learn was how to deal with collectors and professionals on a face to face basis.
The first convention we know Mrs. Norweb attended personally was the 1952 American Numismatic Association Convention, which was held in New York City at the old Statler Hotel. The auction that year was divided among three firms, New Netherlands Coin Company, Grunthal & Gans, and Hans M. R Schulman, who conducted the auction jointly. New Netherlands' sale contained United States colonial and federal issues. Mrs. Norweb traveled from Cleveland to New York, where the family maintained an apartment in River House, and when the bourse opened on August 16, she took her place on the floor along with the scores of other collectors who had come to the convention.
John J. Ford, Jr., who was then New Netherlands Coin Company's "numismatic guiding light", remembers meeting Mrs. Norweb on the bourse floor that year. In an interview with the authors he recalled the meeting:
I met Mrs. Norweb at the 1952 ANA sale in which New Netherlands was a participant, at New York's old Hotel Statler, which now has a different name, right across the street from the old Pennsylvania Station. She was very proper and very correct; my memory is a little vague about what we discussed, but she did buy some material in the 1952 ANA sale [mostly commemorative half dollars]. She struck me as being rather hesitant and almost like a new collector, even though she was an old collector. This was her re-entry into the market. I think if you tie in the fact that her husband retired from the diplomatic service in 1948, in the interval I guess they were getting their act together.