GREYSHEET: NUMISMATIC HOBBY MOURNS THE LOSS OF AN ICON: ERIC NEWMAN PASSES AT 106

BY JOHN FEIGENBAUM, PUBLISHER

Eric P. Newman was a giant in the minds and hearts of the numismatic community-and a dear friend to this publication. So it was with great sadness that, on Wednesday, November 15, we received word that he had passed. Undoubtedly, by the age of 106, Eric Newman had squeezed the most out of life, However, we are all still shocked that this day came to pass.

For a century Mr. Newman (or Eric as he preferred to be called) led a life that was numismatically prolific. And while many know him today as creator of one of the great coin collections ever assembled, his real contributions to our hobby run deep and long. I met Eric several times, encounters that had a profound impact and continue to inspire me. Eric, you will be missed but never forgotten!

On the eve of Eric’s passing, I reached out to Joel Orosz, for a few words. Joel knew Eric extremely well, and was co-author of his recent biography, “Truth Seeker: The Life of Eric P. Newman.” Orosz offered these thoughts:

“In the crypt of London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral is mounted a stone monument to the Cathedral’s architect, Sir Christopher Wren. Its inscription concludes with the Latin words, si monumentum requiris circumspice (if you seek his monument, look around you).

If you seek Eric Newman’s monument, look around you, at the sources of numismatic information he inspired during his long career in the hobby. The Greysheet, Numismatic News, Coin World, and coin websites did not exist when Eric’s first exclusively numismatic article was published in the late 1940s. While he didn’t establish any of the foregoing directly, it was his groundbreaking research that helped create a demand for fact-based publications, and his award-winning books and articles that helped to sustain them.

Eric’s final gift to coin lovers is the Newman Numismatic Portal, essentially the Google for all things numismatic. You can literally find more solid numismatic information in a few hours spent on the Portal than existed when Eric first published nearly 70 years ago. So behold the incredible riches of reliable information at the disposal of today’s dealers and collectors alike, and remember: si monumentum requiris circumspice.”