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Message:: [QUOTE="John Anthony, post: 2122787, member: 42773"]I picked up few Civil War and Hard Times Tokens, and invite anyone else to share theirs. This one is Fuld NY630H-1a, Rarity 1. It's one of the larger CWT's at 24mm. J. L. Fuld established his business in 1842, and according to History and Commerce of New York, 1891, was succeeded by a certain J. Wallace "about 1860." (p. 242) So perhaps Mr. Wallace kept the established name of the business, or "about" is defined by at least three years, since the token is dated 1863. At first I thought the combination of taxidermy and glasswork was odd. Could you bring dearly departed Fido in to have him stuffed and mounted in a glass case? Talk about one-stop-shopping. But the clue to the mystery came from the 1863 Annual Report of the Iowa State Agricultural Society: "Glass eyes can be procured from...J. L. Bode, Naturalist, No. 16 North William street, near Chatham street, N.Y." (p. 331) So Mr. Bode was supplying glass eyes for taxidermists, at least as far west as Iowa. Now the token made sense. (By the way, in case you're wondering why a "bird-stuffer" would put a stag on his token, the term was simply a nickname for taxidermist in the 19th-century.) There is a name in small letters in the antlers - I assume it's the engraver's signature. I read I. HOLOFF. Does anyone see or know different? [ATTACH=full]402639[/ATTACH] This coin is pretty grimy, and it's going to get a good acetone treatment, so I've posted the "before" picture. Also, every single example of this token that I've seen (maybe about a dozen) is weakly-struck in the center of the reverse, even high-grade examples.[/QUOTE]

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