The American Numismatic Association will honor three major figures in American numismatics during the 2026 World’s Fair of Money in Pittsburgh.
Renowned early American coin dealer Anthony Terranova will receive the Chester L. Krause Memorial Distinguished Service Award. It stands as the ANA’s highest honor. Meanwhile, legendary collector Louis E. Eliasberg Sr. and pioneering Chicago dealer Benjamin G. Green will enter the ANA Numismatic Hall of Fame.
The ANA will recognize the honorees during its 135th Anniversary Banquet at the World’s Fair of Money, which runs August 25-29, 2026, at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
For Terranova, however, the honor carries an extraordinary twist.
Anthony Terranova Receives the ANA’s Highest Honor – Again
The ANA Board of Governors selected Terranova as the 2026 recipient of the Chester L. Krause Memorial Distinguished Service Award.
Terranova has spent roughly half a century in numismatics. During that time, he has become one of the hobby’s best-known specialists in Colonial and early American coinage. Yet Terranova often places the people he has met above the coins he has handled.
“The great thing about the hobby is all the people that I’ve met over the years,” Terranova said. “I’ve been doing this about 50 years now. I get teary-eyed just thinking about how many terrific people I’ve met, through the ANA, the American Numismatic Society, the various clubs that I’m a member of, my fellow dealers that I get to know at shows, and the collectors that are around today—some that I’ve known for one year and some that I’ve known for 40 years—I love talking to every one of them.”
That philosophy has defined much of Terranova’s career.
Moreover, the 2026 award marks an unusual chapter in ANA history. Terranova received the Farran Zerbe Memorial Award for Distinguished Service in 2011. At that time, the ANA considered it its highest honor. The association later removed Zerbe’s name and, in 2022, renamed the same distinguished service award for numismatic publisher Chester L. Krause.
Therefore, Terranova now holds recognition under both historic names attached to the ANA’s premier distinguished service award.
Five Decades in the Rare Coin Business
Terranova built his reputation as a self-taught dealer with a sharp eye for early American material.
He began collecting coins as a teenager. Eventually, his interest in Colonial and early federal coinage led him into the professional coin business during the mid-1970s. Over the decades, collectors and fellow professionals have often turned to him when important early American coins required close study.
When he does not travel to conventions, Terranova works from his office in Manhattan alongside his son, who assists him in the business.
More importantly, Terranova has developed a reputation for finding value where others may overlook it. His clients also know him for his extensive numismatic knowledge and straightforward approach.
Terranova continues to study coins even after five decades in the business. Likewise, he encourages younger collectors to keep learning. He has mentored new generations of hobbyists and has devoted his time and financial support to the ANA and its educational mission.
His support of the hobby reaches beyond the ANA. Terranova has maintained a long association with the American Numismatic Society and has donated important material to its collections and library. He has also supported the Smithsonian Institution’s National Numismatic Collection.
The ANA Numismatic Hall of Fame Adds Two Historic Giants
Alongside Terranova’s award, the ANA will induct Louis Edward Eliasberg Sr. (1896-1976) and Benjamin G. Green (1860-1914) into its Numismatic Hall of Fame.
The ANA maintains the Hall of Fame at its Colorado Springs headquarters to honor the most important collectors, researchers, dealers, and other hobby professionals in numismatic history.
ANA historian Jack W. Ogilvie proposed the Hall of Fame during the mid-1960s. The organization drafted bylaws by 1969 and inducted its first class that year. Today, the ANA adds honorees annually under Modern Era and Historic Era criteria.
Few names could carry more historical weight than Eliasberg.
Louis Eliasberg Did What No Other Collector Has Done
Collectors often call Louis E. Eliasberg Sr. the “King of Coins.” The title fits.
Eliasberg accomplished what remains one of the greatest feats in American collecting history. He assembled a collection containing every regular-issue United States coin by date, denomination, and mintmark known to collectors at the time.
He completed the collection in November 1950 after acquiring the unique 1873-CC No Arrows Liberty Seated dime.
No collector before him had accomplished that goal. No collector has duplicated it since.
The achievement becomes even more remarkable when viewed through the collecting standards of Eliasberg’s era. Collectors at the time did not necessarily separate Proofs from circulation strikes as modern registry sets do. Therefore, Eliasberg sought one coin for every recognized date and mint rather than every modern strike classification or die variety.
Still, his accomplishment remains without equal.
Eliasberg also demanded quality. Consequently, his cabinet contained many great American rarities and numerous coins that rank among the finest known examples of their issues.
A Coin Collection Became a National Attraction
Eliasberg did not simply lock his collection in a vault.
Instead, he shared it.
Selections appeared in exhibitions at banks and other venues around the United States. Then, during the nation’s Bicentennial in 1976, the Philadelphia Mint displayed the Eliasberg Collection for four months.
The exhibit reportedly attracted more than 1.5 million visitors.
That public exposure helped turn Eliasberg from an elite collector into one of the most recognizable names in American numismatic history.
After his death in 1976, his family eventually dispersed the collection through a series of landmark sales. Bowers and Ruddy sold the United States gold coins in 1982. Bowers and Merena then offered the copper, nickel, and silver coins in major 1996 and 1997 auctions. Other Eliasberg holdings later reached the market as well.
More than 75 years after he completed his U.S. collection, collectors still use the Eliasberg name as a benchmark for pedigree, quality, and completeness.
Benjamin G. Green Helped Build the Early American Coin Market
The second 2026 Historic Era inductee, Benjamin G. Green, helped shape organized numismatics during the opening years of the 20th century.
Green worked as a dealer, auctioneer, author, collector, and hobby leader in Chicago.
He entered the coin business around 1902. From 1902 through 1914, Green conducted 84 numismatic auctions, including the ANA convention sales of 1907 and 1911.
Therefore, the original press release’s description of “more than 80 auctions” actually understates the documented total.
Green also published the Numismatist’s Reference and Check Book in 1902. The compact reference gave collectors a working list of United States coins and became a useful tool during an era before the hobby had today’s enormous library of standardized references.
Green Helped Make Chicago a Numismatic Center
Green also played an active role in organized numismatics.
He served the ANA as librarian and curator. Then, in 1913, members elected him to the ANA Board of Governors. He also belonged to the American Numismatic Society and took a leadership role in Chicago numismatic organizations.
His collecting interests reached well beyond conventional United States coins.
Green assembled an important collection of Masonic mark pennies. By 1906, he owned about 650 different pieces. His collection reportedly grew to roughly 2,600 varieties by the time of his death in 1914.
He also built an exceptional collection of encased postage stamps and exhibited examples at ANA conventions in 1911, 1912, and 1913.
Collectors remembered Green not only for his knowledge, however. They also praised his friendliness, fairness, and willingness to help other numismatists.
His death in Chicago in January 1914 cut short one of the most productive careers of the early hobby. Still, his auction business, publications, club work, collecting, and ANA service left a lasting legacy.
Three Numismatists, Three Different Legacies
Terranova, Eliasberg, and Green represent three different eras of American numismatics.
Green helped build the infrastructure of the organized hobby during the early 20th century.
Eliasberg then demonstrated how far a determined collector could push the idea of completeness. His collection became a national attraction and remains a standard against which collectors measure great cabinets.
Finally, Terranova represents the living connection between scholarship, dealing, mentorship, and the relationships that keep numismatics moving from one generation to the next.
The ANA will celebrate all three during the 2026 World’s Fair of Money, August 25-29 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh. The convention will bring together hundreds of dealers while offering major numismatic exhibits, educational programs, family activities, and opportunities for collectors from around the world to meet and trade.
For a hobby built around objects that can survive for centuries, the 2026 honors make an appropriate point: coins may preserve history, but people create the legacy.
