Welcome to the Tarnished Truth, your newsletter. As your collection of coins and numismatic knowledge grow you will find that you will change your goals many times. This of course is partly because as a person gets older he usually has more funds and in some cases time to spend upon his hobby. The trick of course is not to lose that wild giddy excitement that you had when you aquired that first must have coin. You may pass some of your first coins on to a new collector, but you will still have the knowledge and memories that each coin brought to your collection. If you are lucky such a coin will appreciate as much in knowledge value as it does in monetary value.

Two new features this month. First is one I am calling Exceptional E which will be an e-mail that appears on the list that the editor believes deserve a better frame. Also we are unvailing our new feature Ancient Pocketchange by our own Josh Moran. Be most careful or this young man will start you out on an entirely new collecting venture, one of those goal changes I mentioned earlier.

I think I was born to be a collector of coins and other history related items.

I arrived in this world in November 1943 in a Japanese POW Camp in Shanghai China. Actually my birth was in a local hospital but the next 2 years were spent behind bars. No not the alcaholic type, that was later in my teens. Mother reckons she did not put a single pound of weight in the 9 months she was carrying me and was expecting a rabbit, but she got a coin collector instead.

Before the war dad had been with the Police in the International Settlement in Shanghai. After the war he was out of a job, as the International Settlement had been given back to the Chinese Government. He left for Hong Kong in mid 1946 and got a job with the Police. The family followed early in 1947. I still have memories of the primative conditions in Hong Kong at the end of the war. In 1948 dad left the Police and joined the HK Tramway Company. Dad got 8 months home leave every 4 years. The family got a return trip to the UK. He was from St Albans in Hertfordshire, just north of London. His idea of a holiday was a slow freighter that took 6 weeks to get from HK to Europe. The return trip was always on a Cruise liner that took 3 weeks.

The 1952 trip went to Manila & Cebu in the Philippines, Singapore, Port Swetenham & Penang in Malaya, Colombo, Bombay, Aden, Port Said & Alexandria in Egypt, Genoa, Marseille, Barcelona, Antwerp before ending in Rotterdam. Considering I was 9 at the time I still have some vivid memories of this trip. In Alexandria we visited the palace where the war time leaders held their conference. In Aden we saw the wells where the water was stored for the drought years. In Genoa we visited the cemetary where I think Caruso was buried. In Marseille we went to the Island of Chateau D'If in the harbour and saw the cell where the real Count of Monte Cristo from the Dumas book was said to have been imprisoned. My coin collection had also started as I kept all the change from every stop and would count them and view them every night.

Actually I probably had an earlier collection as I have memories of lots of Chinese and Japanese bank notes that were worthless at the end of the war. JIM money now is very collectable. Which just proves one should take care of everything, as each has its turn. A second trip in 1956 was similar to the first except we spent a month in the Philippines loading copra. We also visited Beirut which was a beautiful city with harmonious relations between the different religions at that period. I can remember vistiting the Roman ruins at Baalbek, driving up to the Cedars in the mountains and another trip to Damascus in Syria. Also drove through the coastal phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon.

Both trips ended in Rotterdam with an overnight ferry trip from the Hook of Holland to Harwich and a train to London. Dad always picked up a new car in London. Since we always took the car back to HK with us, he did not have to pay any tax. 6 months was spent in the UK visiting family and friends and touring around the British Isles.

Father passed away of a massive heart attack in 1958 aged 52. He literally died in my arms, without a thing I could do. Mother mourned him and did not forgive him for leaving her. I am sure when she passed away in 1993 she would have met up with him and nagged him, making up for the lost 35 years.

I continued in an aimless sort of life in Hong Kong. In 1964 I met my wife in HK. Her family had been recently posted to HK by the Australian Government. A friend of theirs had arranged a party for them and tried to organise a few boys to partner the 3 girls. My friend Tony called to see if I was available. Free food and drink at a local nightclub with girls thrown in. Sure I was. Anyway the meeting was arranged and I met my future wife Heather. In 1967 the family went back to Canberra and I had arranged to immigrate to Australia. In 1969 we got married and in October 1973 my daughter Aisha was born. In the interim had found a job with Qantas Airways in Reservations. It came as a very pleasant surprise to me to learn of all the perks in the airlines, however I also found that it was to make up for the poor salary. The next 24 years was spend working in the airline industry and travelling around parts of the world. In 1991 just after the Gulf War I was retrenched, just short of my 25th year with the company. The next year was spent looking for a job. I had 3 which each lasted 6 weeks. Then I spent the next 3 years with the Inbound Tourism Organisation developing a Tour Guide Accreditation Program. For a while I was unemployed and when I turned 55 I gave up and retired. Just as well as it turned out, as my daughter got glandular fever and from that came an illness called sarcoidosis, which she has had since and which has confined her to bed. She needs constant care. We sold both houses (theirs and ours) and bought a larger one, where I, my wife, daughter and son in law live comfortably together. Son in law is the computer expert, so any problems get fixed very quickly. We are all on a cable network, which make internet access very easy.

When my daughter was born in 1973 there was no spare money for anything. At that time I had been a keen stamp collector and coins were a minor interest. It took until 1976 before there was any spare cash to spend on collections and I went back into coins, with the stamps taking a back seat. My initial aim was to collect the coins of Hong Kong where I had spent 20 of my growing years. I also collected British East Asia, Straits Settlements, Sarawak, British North Borneo, then expanded westwards with the other British Colonies. Ceylon, Mauritius, East Africa, Southern Rhodesia and British West Africa. The rest of the world was also collected but passively, then the collction took a different turn into bi-metallics and the World by type. Starting with the ABC (Argentina, Brazil & Chile) of South America. I now have over 300 of the 600 plus type coins of Brazil the earliest coin being a 1695 640 Reis in VF condition, a nice big silver coin about the size of an Ike dollar.

In September 1996 I joined my first internet coin club, the WBCC - Worldwide Bi-metallic Collector Club and as I had also just got on to the internet and had my own site with 2 megs of space, I offered to host the WBCC site which I developed till JD very kindly offered to assist with last year. I somehow managed to get him to take it over. These sites can be very deceptive, as JD found out, (I did tell you it was big). The WBCC image library had over 2000 images and an archive of the weekly newletter send out over nearly 6 years. Newsmail 303 was published out on Saturday 1st June. A newsletter without fail for 303 weeks.

I also joined coinmasters and was member 65. It was an interesting time. The internet and email made communications so much easier. In those early days I can remember speaking for hours with Marion who was only 4 hours time difference from me in Hawaii and with Aram and many other West Coast members. I made many contacts with collectors around the world and most of us still actively swap coins today. I know for sure there are many terrific Australian Collections around the World, as I have supplied most of the coins.

When Wins was formed I quickly joined, but was fairly quiet for most of the time. I had just started a HK stamp study group on the internet and had joined 8 active members around the world together, to study company security markings on early HK stamps. We now have images of 60% of the 830 known marking listed in the site, which I manage. Now that it is as complete as possible. I can again get involved in other things like making a nuisance of myself here.

Thanks for listening.