Whitman Publishing announces the release of the 2015 and 2016 Limited Editions of A Guide Book of United States Coins (the hobby’s popular retail-pricing guide known as the “Red Book”). The 448-page leather-bound books will be available June 23, 2015, including online at www.Whitman.com, for $99.95 each. Each is limited to a print run of 500 copies.
These special volumes are published in a large format (6.25 by 9.25 inches, compared to 5.25 by 7.75 inches for the regular edition). Each copy is individually numbered and personally autographed by Red Book senior editor Kenneth Bressett. The Limited Editions are handsomely constructed with red-leather binding, gold-stamped lettering on the covers, gilt-edged pages, a hubbed spine, high-quality paper, and a silk page marker. A Certificate of Limited Edition is bound into each copy.
“Over the years, the Limited Edition Red Book has become a collectible in its own right,” says Whitman publisher Dennis Tucker. “Past editions have sold out with 1,000 to 3,000 copies printed. This scarcity is multiplied by a low print run of just 500 copies each for the 2015 and 2016 editions.”
The first leather-bound Limited Edition Red Book was the 2005-dated version, introduced in 2004. Numismatic historian Frank J. Colletti catalogs and discusses the early Limited Editions in chapter 5 of the Guide Book of the Official Red Book of United States Coins.
“As you might suspect, I am an avid collector of every issue and variety of the Red Book,” said senior editor Kenneth Bressett. “The Limited Editions are the pride of my set and a highlight of my entire library.”
Rare books, auction catalogs, periodicals, and other literature comprise a specialized field of collecting in numismatics. Enthusiasts are encouraged to join the Numismatic Bibliomania Society, an educational organization founded in 1979 to support and promote the use and collecting of numismatic literature.