Breen’s Annotated Copy of Carothers

Carothers, Neil. FRACTIONAL MONEY: A HISTORY OF THE SMALL COINS AND FRACTIONAL CURRENCY OF THE UNITED STATES. New York: Wiley, 1930. Small 8vo, original red cloth, gilt. Frontispiece; xiii, (1), 372 pages. Signed by Walter Breen and two other previous owners. Penciled annotations by Breen on dozen or more pages. Very good or better. Breen’s copy of the scarce original edition of this important reference, originally the author’s 1916 Princeton doctoral dissertation. Seven decades after publication, it remains a storehouse of useful and important numismatic information on U.S. coins and fractional currency. Pete Smith has written that “Much of the original edition was destroyed in a warehouse fire.” Clain-Stefanelli 13465. Grierson 221: “L’un intérêt et d’une valeur exceptionnels.” Sigler 441. Voted as one of the Numismatic Bibliomania Society’s “One Hundred Greatest Items of United States Numismatic Literature.”