By Hubert Walker for CoinWeek ….
Rick Snow, numismatic author and owner of Eagle Eye Rare Coins in Tucson, Arizona, is offering readers a special pre-publication deal on the upcoming third edition of the Flying Eagle and Indian Cent Attribution Guide.
First published in 1992 as simply Flying Eagles and Indian Cents, the “Snow” book started out as a 161-page tome in black and white only. Between 2000 and 2008, the project had been renamed the Flying Eagle and Indian Cent Attribution Guide and encompassed 750 pages over four volumes.
The soon-to-be-completed third edition is a hardcover, two-volume set with 900 full-color pages.
Fans of the Flying Eagle and Indian Head cent series know Rick Snow as one of the leading experts in the field and are well-acquainted with his book A Guide Book of Flying Eagle and Indian Head Cents (2nd ed., 2009), part of Whitman’s Official Red Book series. The Attribution Guide is the epitome of 26 years of research and dedication.
The printing and publishing of the third edition, however, is no small feat.
In order to fund this expensive endeavour, Mr. Snow has turned to Kickstarter.com to “crowdfund” its publication. For those of you not familiar with Kickstarter or crowdfunding, Kickstarter (and various websites like it) lets people donate various amounts to projects they deem worthy. In return, the project’s creator offers special gifts and benefits of increasing value to his or her donors (according to the amount of each contribution) that are available nowhere else and only for the duration of the Kickstarter campaign.
If you click on the link above, you’ll see that Mr. Snow offers the following packages to his supporters (amounts are in US dollars):
- A pledge of $17 or more gets your name in the book as a Kickstarter contributor.
- A pledge of $45 or more gets your name in the book as a Kickstarter contributor and a signed copy of Whitman’s Guide Book of Flying Eagle and Indian Head Cents.
- A pledge of $75 or more gets your name in the book, a signed copy of Whitman’s Guide Book, and an electronic version (PDF) of the Attribution Guide that you can read on an iPad, Android tablet, or other variety of E-Reader.
- A pledge of $225 or more gets your name in the book, a signed copy of Whitman’s Guide Book, an electronic version (PDF) of the Attribution Guide, and numbered and signed editions of the finished hardcover volumes.
The Kickstarter campaign started July 23 and runs through August 29, 2014. The project will be funded if it receives $42,500 in donations. As of July 25, it has 39 backers, who together have pledged $8,688 (or approx. 20% of the total). So act fast!
You can see a small preview of the book if you visit Mr. Snow’s website.
As a means of allowing truly independent numismatic research to reach the collecting public, we are encouraged and excited by such enterprises as Kickstarter.com and its ilk. Please take a moment to check it out and see what this new entrepreneurial movement is all about.
