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Tuesday, May 27, 2003

By Dan Majors, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

A nickel just isn't worth what it used to be. There's supposedly one out there that is worth $1 million.

The Associated Press yesterday reported that Bowers and Merena Galleries, rare coin dealers in Wolfeboro, N.H., are offering a million-dollar reward for the fifth 1913 Liberty Head Nickel, which has been missing since 1962.

	There are only five 1913 Liberty Head nickels in the world. Four have been accounted for, but Bowers and Merena Galleries in Wolfeboro, N.H. is offering a $ 1 million reward to anyone who finds the fifth. (Bowers and Merena Galleries via AP)

Only five of the coins were minted 90 years ago under circumstances that can best be described as dubious.

Liberty Head Nickels were produced from 1883 to 1912. The year 1913 saw the introduction of the Indian or Buffalo Nickel.

But due to disputes over the new nickel's design -- a New York-based manufacturer of vending machines demanded modifications -- the mint didn't start making Buffalo Nickels until February.

And somebody at the Philadelphia mint decided to put another 25 cents into the economy.

Actually, the five coins never made it into circulation. They were passed along among numismatists. (People with uncommon cents.)

Two of the nickels are still in the hands of private collectors. Two others are in museums.

According to legend, the fifth Liberty Head Nickel -- called the Reynolds Nickel -- was in the possession of George O. Walton, a collector and dealer in North Carolina, who on March 9, 1962, was transporting the rare coin for a possible sale involving a member of the R.J. Reynolds tobacco family.

But Walton was involved in a car crash. And the coin was never seen again.

In 1996, Bowers and Merena Galleries auctioned one of the 1913 nickels for $1.4 million, the first coin to sell for more than $1 million. It is because of that price that the company is offering a $1 million bounty for the missing nickel.

"There's a little bit of gimmick to it," concedes Paul Montgomery, president of Bowers and Merena. "But it's all about trying to find the coin."

Associated Press reporter David Tirrell-Wysocki quoted Beth Deisher, editor of Coin World magazine in Sidney, Ohio, as saying that a nickel recovered from the 1962 car wreck was not the fifth coin. It was a Liberty Head Nickel, all right, but not from 1913. The date had been altered.

So what became of the fifth nickel? That's what Bowers and Merena want to find out.

"Everybody in the industry would love to see it," Montgomery said.

And coin collectors love this stuff. It gets people talking and looking at their coins. The industry starts buzzing. And some rare prizes turn up.

So you might want to check those sofa cushions and piggy banks a little closer.

Change can be a good thing.

You can have the euro;
give me a 1913 Liberty Head Nickel

Numismatists aren't the only ones interested in the fluctuating value of currency. So are economists.

This item is hot off the wire services: The euro broke its all-time high against the U.S. dollar early this morning, reaching $1.1885 in Tokyo trading. That's up from $1.1814 in trading late yesterday.

The old record for the euro was $1.1884, the exchange rate on Jan. 4, 1999, three days after the new-fangled money was launched.

Against the yen, the euro bought 138.65 yen this morning in Tokyo, up from 138.08 yen.

Bloomberg News reports that the euro has been rising since Treasury Secretary John Snow last week suggested U.S. officials are content to see the dollar slide. Weaker dollars help exporters and spur the economy.

"It's all on the dollar side -- there are uncertainties about current U.S. policy toward the dollar, deflation, and the prospect of lower rates in the States," said Jake Moore, a strategist at Barclays Capital in Tokyo.

The euro "trend is up."

Dan Majors can be reached at dmajors@post-gazette.com.