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1915-16 Panama California Exposition

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1915-16 Panama California Exposition Thread

billycgribble has reacted to this post.
billycgribble

Attached are a few photos of some of the PanCal Expo SCD's I am lucky to have along with a photo of the award medal from that expo. A great many of the buildings from this expo survive to this day in Balboa Park. Note that this type of building architecture was used in the 1892 World's Columbian Expo for the California Building. A gilt variety of HK-432 is known to exist. On the reverse of HK-433, all the emblems around the Swastika represent good luck in different cultures, with the symbols in the lower right corner thought to represent good luck in an ancient language (? Numismatist article talking about this in the past 10 years?). I am looking forward to Jeff and Bill's book on Pacific Coast Expositions in the next few years. As an aside, there are also rare award medals from the 1936 California Pacific Expo (also in San Diego) and some fairly rare So Called Dollars made... in spite of the US Mint 1936 Half Dollar shown in the Red Book being quite obtainable... more of this will be discussed in Jeff and Bill's upcoming west coast expo book...

Uploaded files:
  • HK-432a.jpg
  • HK-433.jpeg
  • 1916-CA-Awd-Medal-San-Diego.jpg

Original plate coin...

HK-432a example (copper) thanks to Randy ! Bill H, can you elaborate on any other examples from this expo that we might want to be aware of (before the book comes out?)

In a week or so when I get a chance to go through my notes.

The HK-432a example (copper) is thanks to Randy ! Bill H, can you elaborate on any other examples from this expo that we might want to be aware of (before the book comes out?)

Here is a gold-plated CA Pacific Award Medal (1936). I found it very interesting to read Joe Levine's auction catalog entry on the 1935 gold-plated 70mm award medal for sale in the 2013 Baltimore auction. Apparently the 1936 version is a rare variety. These 1935 medals were made from unsigned hand cut dies by MACO (1000 struck in bronze, 250 gold plated and 350 silver plated). Expect to pay near $700 for a 1935 item in the auction...

Uploaded files:
  • 1936-Award.jpeg

Another addition to the Panama-California collection .. 2.5" aluminum medals from an important collector (thanks Randy!). Note the similarity to HK-432. The manufacturer is EA Caspary of Los Angeles, CA, who also made HK-432 and an unlisted SCD listed on John Raymond's site (image of #65 below). These large aluminum medals fit in nicely with the SCDs from this exposition even so it's larger than a typical SCD.

Uploaded files:
  • 1915-Opening-2.5in-Medal.jpg
  • 1915-WestGate-2.5in-Medal.jpg

Another wonderful piece courtesy of Jeff Shevlin? HK-434

Uploaded files:
  • HK-434.jpg

HK-434 Storecard ?

Technically this piece would be a storecard, but we researched the question further while finalizing our listings for the new book. U.S. Grant's grandson was part owner of the Grant Hotel (named for U.S. Grant) and he was president of the exposition planning committee. The hotel was the headquarters of the planing effort and many of the exposition functions leading up to the opening were held at the hotel. We decided to leave it in the book as a SCD because of its central importance in the exposition.

HK-434 Storecard ?

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