Never been there, but it brings me back to a thread I started a while ago about dealers handling coins with their bare hands. Just watch this guy.
Yes he does. Curtis Clay who works there is one of the most knowledgable, helpful men you could ever find in ancient coin collecting. There are only 14 I believe Constantine 13th Byzantine coins known, (the last Byzantine emperor), at one time Harlan owned 13 of them. Yes, he handles some high end coins. Btw anyone going to CICF Harlan usually has a few tables right on the end when you first come in.
I just saw him handle ancients or a couple circulated dollars. Our ancient coins aren't little sissy coins like modern coins are. We don't have to worry about "tainting" their surfaces with fingerprints. We get to actually touch our coins free of fear.
So Chris, you're saying if I sneezed all over your gold aureus of titus coin you'd simply wipe it off with a paper towel and call it good? Guy
Well, if I had one, if you sneezed on it I would wipe it off with a soft towel and no harm would be done. Ancient coins develop a hard crust, and I have wiped silver and bronze coins intentionally with a soft towel and have never seen an effect, even under 32x stereo magnification. I have never tried it with gold, but imagine it would be the same.
Yeah, I just don't know HOW coins survived until the advent of latex gloves and plastic slabs. Why oh why did they not just all wear away? Sorry to be snarky, but gentlemen like Mr. Berk know 10,000 times more than at least what I know about coins. I trust he understands what can be damaging to a coin and what isn't. He has handled well into the 8 figures in coins over his career, if in current values probably over a billion. If he were systemically damaging them I think he would pay attention. Could his treatment take a modern coin from 70 to 68? Possibly, but I have never seen such modern collectibles in his store. I see other dealers with equal experience handle their coins the same way. If you notice in the video, the one BU looking gold I only see him holding by the edges. That is what I do, for a modern BU coin I handle the edges only. Just my opinion though. Edit: Sorry again if this sounded snarky Pilkenton. No offense meant, it was just meant to be funny.
