Kolbe & Fanning
Auction 164 27 Aug 2022
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The Eshbach-Cardinal Collection of Charles Steigerwalt Catalogues
Steigerwalt, Chas. AUCTION CATALOGUES. Lancaster and New York, 1881-1910. Sixty-eight auction sale catalogues, being Adams Nos. 1-30, 32-46, 48-51, 53, 55-56, 58-68, plus Adams 2A, 2B, 24A, Haseltine's Sale 86 dated June 13, 1887 (of which Steigerwalt catalogued lots 251-563), and the Henkels sale of September 10, 1894 catalogued by Steigerwalt. Mostly 8vo [slightly varying sizes], generally with original printed paper covers where issued. Sales 1, 4, 13, 15, 38, 62 and (most of) 63 hand-priced. Condition varies from good to fine, with most being very good or better. [with] Steigerwalt, Chas. FIXED PRICE LISTS. Lancaster, Pennsylvania, 1885-1911 (a few undated). One hundred thirty-two different fixed price lists, being Adams Nos. 1-12, 12A, 13-25, 25A, 26-39, 41-48, 48A, 49-53, 55, 55A, 56, 56A-56D, 57, 57A, 58-61, 61A-61C, 62, 62A, 62B, 62D, 62E, 62F, 63, 63A, 63B, 64A-64D, 65A, 65AA, 65B, 65BB, 65C-65E, 66A-66C, 67A, 67B, 68A-68H, 69A, 70, 71, 71A, 71B, 72A-72K, and 72O-72T, 72V-72Z and 72AA (see comments). Also includes one premium-paid list not listed by Bourne. Varying sizes, generally with original printed paper covers where issued. Condition varies from good to fine, with most being very good or so. Possibly the finest collection of Charlie Steigerwalt's catalogues ever assembled--certainly the finest ever offered publicly. Steigerwalt's location left him far removed from most of the numismatic activity of 19th-century America. As John W. Adams has written, "That an individual could begin, much less carry on for thirty-three years, a coin dealership in the hamlet of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, is pertinent testimony as to the character of the man." Despite the limitations he faced due to his distance from the larger cities, Steigerwalt handled some very impressive coins over his career--a fact that is only now becoming widely appreciated. His catalogues are always scarce and often rare. Adams page 106: "Early in his career (1881), Steigerwalt claims to have amassed a mailing list of over one thousand names. Perhaps so, but present availability of catalogs would suggest either much lower emissions or extraordinarily poor survival. Whichever, there's darned little Steigerwalt material to go around nowadays. Given the man's great interest in such specialties as colonial paper and large cents, not to mention his expertise overall, the time spent building a file on Charlie Steigerwalt is amply rewarded." The run of Steigerwalt auction sales present here is remarkably complete, missing only five sales listed by Adams (31, 47, 52, 54 and 57), while including a Stan Henkels sale that should be included (September 10, 1894) and a Haseltine sale that should be cross-listed as partly catalogued by Steigerwalt (June 13, 1887). Sale 47 is noted as "not seen" by Adams and was also missing from Champa--it may not exist. This run includes sales 2A, 2B, 24A and 65, which were not included in the Champa library. The run of Steigerwalt's bibliographically confusing fixed price catalogues is exceptionally complete. John Eshbach, who formed the core of this collection, was a contributor to the 2001 Additions and Corrections supplement to Adams Volume I, and many of these are the discovery copies of Steigerwalt catalogues that were listed for the first time in that supplement. Including the numerous additions made to the Adams corpus in 2001, the Eshbach-Cardinal collection is only missing the following numbers: 40, 52A, 54, 58, 62C, 65F, and 72L-72N. We are delisting Adams 72U as being 72H: Adams 72H is listed as having 20 pages, when the catalogue that is clearly a continuation of 72G has 16 pages. We are correcting Adams 62F as having 19 printed pages, not 16. We are adding the following to the corpus: Catalogue 57A (a separately paginated offprint, now in 24 pages, of pages 68-91 of Catalogue 57, now headed "American Medals"); Catalogue 65AA (dated March 1905, 4 pages titled simply "For Sale by...," with the first heading being "Miscellaneous Coins"); Catalogue 65BB ("Revised to October 1905," 16 pages, "$25,000 Collection, The Foreign Section..."); Catalogue 72W ("Books, Including Washington, Early American Imprints...," undated, 8 pages); Catalogue 72X ("Early American Views...," undated, 14 printed pages); Catalogue 72Y ("A Fine Collection of Early American Maps...," undated, 8 pages); Catalogue 72Z ("Catalogue of a Choice Collection of Books Mostly Relating to Early America...," undated, 31 printed pages); and Catalogue 72AA ("Washington Books, Engravings, Etc., Etc.," undated, 27 printed pages). This lot includes lists 41 and 47, both of remained listed as "not seen" by Adams, and includes list 70 (completely unlisted by Adams). Number 47 was not present in the Champa holdings (as the Champa sale was held before the publication of the 2001 Adams supplement, direct comparison of Eshbach and Champa's holdings is sometimes difficult to make). John Eshbach (1921-2011) was a longtime collector and a guiding force behind the Pennsylvania Association of Numismatists (PAN). A native of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, his interest in numismatic literature focused on the publications of Charles Steigerwalt, who also lived in Lancaster. Eshbach was a recipient of the Farren Zerbe Award from the American Numismatic Association, and was heavily involved in judging exhibits for the ANA. Steigerwalt publications are notoriously difficult to collect. While the set assembled by Armand Champa and sold (in multiple lots) as part of his library was slightly larger than the Eshbach collection, the pieces which have been added to it under the Cardinal Collection banner have made it so now the collection surpasses that of Champa. Mostly ex John Eshbach Library (Kolbe & Fanning's 2013 New York Book Auction, lot 251); ex Cardinal Collection Library.
(Estimate: $5000)
Steigerwalt, Chas. AUCTION CATALOGUES. Lancaster and New York, 1881-1910. Sixty-eight auction sale catalogues, being Adams Nos. 1-30, 32-46, 48-51, 53, 55-56, 58-68, plus Adams 2A, 2B, 24A, Haseltine's Sale 86 dated June 13, 1887 (of which Steigerwalt catalogued lots 251-563), and the Henkels sale of September 10, 1894 catalogued by Steigerwalt. Mostly 8vo [slightly varying sizes], generally with original printed paper covers where issued. Sales 1, 4, 13, 15, 38, 62 and (most of) 63 hand-priced. Condition varies from good to fine, with most being very good or better. [with] Steigerwalt, Chas. FIXED PRICE LISTS. Lancaster, Pennsylvania, 1885-1911 (a few undated). One hundred thirty-two different fixed price lists, being Adams Nos. 1-12, 12A, 13-25, 25A, 26-39, 41-48, 48A, 49-53, 55, 55A, 56, 56A-56D, 57, 57A, 58-61, 61A-61C, 62, 62A, 62B, 62D, 62E, 62F, 63, 63A, 63B, 64A-64D, 65A, 65AA, 65B, 65BB, 65C-65E, 66A-66C, 67A, 67B, 68A-68H, 69A, 70, 71, 71A, 71B, 72A-72K, and 72O-72T, 72V-72Z and 72AA (see comments). Also includes one premium-paid list not listed by Bourne. Varying sizes, generally with original printed paper covers where issued. Condition varies from good to fine, with most being very good or so. Possibly the finest collection of Charlie Steigerwalt's catalogues ever assembled--certainly the finest ever offered publicly. Steigerwalt's location left him far removed from most of the numismatic activity of 19th-century America. As John W. Adams has written, "That an individual could begin, much less carry on for thirty-three years, a coin dealership in the hamlet of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, is pertinent testimony as to the character of the man." Despite the limitations he faced due to his distance from the larger cities, Steigerwalt handled some very impressive coins over his career--a fact that is only now becoming widely appreciated. His catalogues are always scarce and often rare. Adams page 106: "Early in his career (1881), Steigerwalt claims to have amassed a mailing list of over one thousand names. Perhaps so, but present availability of catalogs would suggest either much lower emissions or extraordinarily poor survival. Whichever, there's darned little Steigerwalt material to go around nowadays. Given the man's great interest in such specialties as colonial paper and large cents, not to mention his expertise overall, the time spent building a file on Charlie Steigerwalt is amply rewarded." The run of Steigerwalt auction sales present here is remarkably complete, missing only five sales listed by Adams (31, 47, 52, 54 and 57), while including a Stan Henkels sale that should be included (September 10, 1894) and a Haseltine sale that should be cross-listed as partly catalogued by Steigerwalt (June 13, 1887). Sale 47 is noted as "not seen" by Adams and was also missing from Champa--it may not exist. This run includes sales 2A, 2B, 24A and 65, which were not included in the Champa library. The run of Steigerwalt's bibliographically confusing fixed price catalogues is exceptionally complete. John Eshbach, who formed the core of this collection, was a contributor to the 2001 Additions and Corrections supplement to Adams Volume I, and many of these are the discovery copies of Steigerwalt catalogues that were listed for the first time in that supplement. Including the numerous additions made to the Adams corpus in 2001, the Eshbach-Cardinal collection is only missing the following numbers: 40, 52A, 54, 58, 62C, 65F, and 72L-72N. We are delisting Adams 72U as being 72H: Adams 72H is listed as having 20 pages, when the catalogue that is clearly a continuation of 72G has 16 pages. We are correcting Adams 62F as having 19 printed pages, not 16. We are adding the following to the corpus: Catalogue 57A (a separately paginated offprint, now in 24 pages, of pages 68-91 of Catalogue 57, now headed "American Medals"); Catalogue 65AA (dated March 1905, 4 pages titled simply "For Sale by...," with the first heading being "Miscellaneous Coins"); Catalogue 65BB ("Revised to October 1905," 16 pages, "$25,000 Collection, The Foreign Section..."); Catalogue 72W ("Books, Including Washington, Early American Imprints...," undated, 8 pages); Catalogue 72X ("Early American Views...," undated, 14 printed pages); Catalogue 72Y ("A Fine Collection of Early American Maps...," undated, 8 pages); Catalogue 72Z ("Catalogue of a Choice Collection of Books Mostly Relating to Early America...," undated, 31 printed pages); and Catalogue 72AA ("Washington Books, Engravings, Etc., Etc.," undated, 27 printed pages). This lot includes lists 41 and 47, both of remained listed as "not seen" by Adams, and includes list 70 (completely unlisted by Adams). Number 47 was not present in the Champa holdings (as the Champa sale was held before the publication of the 2001 Adams supplement, direct comparison of Eshbach and Champa's holdings is sometimes difficult to make). John Eshbach (1921-2011) was a longtime collector and a guiding force behind the Pennsylvania Association of Numismatists (PAN). A native of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, his interest in numismatic literature focused on the publications of Charles Steigerwalt, who also lived in Lancaster. Eshbach was a recipient of the Farren Zerbe Award from the American Numismatic Association, and was heavily involved in judging exhibits for the ANA. Steigerwalt publications are notoriously difficult to collect. While the set assembled by Armand Champa and sold (in multiple lots) as part of his library was slightly larger than the Eshbach collection, the pieces which have been added to it under the Cardinal Collection banner have made it so now the collection surpasses that of Champa. Mostly ex John Eshbach Library (Kolbe & Fanning's 2013 New York Book Auction, lot 251); ex Cardinal Collection Library.
(Estimate: $5000)