Curator & Collector

Image of 1911 $500 Canadian Queen Mary Banknote taken from Canada.com story An extremely rare Canadian banknote that was “destined for the shredder” was recently sold in a Heritage Auction Galleries-brokered sale, fetching a price of $322,000 US, a record for Canadian banknotes. The Dominion of Canada banknote, which is one of only three known [...]

Artist’s rendering of the new Canadian Sacrifice Medal taken from the website of the Governor-General The current edition of Canadian Coin News has a front page article on the new Sacrifice Medal that has just been approved by the Governor-General, on behalf of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, for the Canadian Armed Forces. The stark [...]

Despite my intention, stated only two posts ago, to resume blogging about museums and numismatics, I feel I cannot quite get there before writing down a few thoughts on the recent election of the Conservative Party as a strengthened minority party. Some in the news media are blaming the fact that the Tories let a [...]

Having a train to herself: the miniature Burnaby Central Railway Railways are almost indigenous to British Columbia, the province having developed in the Canadian context to a great extent because of the railway. Since that is so, there are a variety of rail-related tourist hotspots in BC, the Burnaby Central Railroad being among them. While [...]

It is with pleasure that I note that Macleans has won the infamous Mark Steyn lawsuit before the BC Human Rights Tribunal. I still think that, despite a long and thoughtful email from the Attorney-General (to which I shall be replying), this case should never have been brought before this forum. And now, back to [...]

An apparently genuine 1£ coin from the United Kingdom At each stage of Canadian history, Canadian coins and tokens have been faked by unscrupulous people. While this was often driven by poverty and desperation, fakes are now becoming big business internationally. In the United Kingdom, the the BBC is reporting that the the number of [...]