Suspecting that their friend has been swindled, the Hardy brothers investigate and find themselves on the trail of a much larger criminal operation.

This book offers an in-depth chronological survey of every silver dollar type, including pricing, mintages, and estimated populations, complimented by a thoughtful review of these authentic coins' histories. From the most commonly collected Morgan dollar to the silver dollar's counterpart, the trade dollar, and a new chapter on the golden Sacagawea, John Dannreuther's fully updated edition of Q. David Bowers' original work highlights the progress of this famous part of American coinage.

It's the most valuable ounce of gold in the world, the celebrated, the fabled, the infamous 1933 double eagle, illegal to own and coveted all the more, sought with passion by men of wealth and with steely persistence by the United States government for more than a half century—it shouldn't even exist but it does, and its astonishing, true adventures read like "a composite of The Lord of the Rings and The Maltese Falcon" (The New York Times). In 1905, at the height of the exuberant Gilded Age, President Theodore Roosevelt commissioned America's greatest sculptor, Augustus Saint-Gaudens—as he battled in vain for his life—to create what became America's most beautiful coin. In 1933 the hopes of America dimmed in the darkness of the Great Depression, and gold—the nation's lifeblood—hemorrhaged from the financial system. As the economy teetered on the brink of total collapse, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in his first act as president, assumed wartime powers while the nation was at peace and in a "swift, staccato action" unprecedented in United States history recalled all gold and banned its private ownership. But the United States Mint continued, quite legally, to strike nearly a half million 1933 double eagles that were never issued and were deemed illegal to own. In 1937, along with countless millions of other gold coins, they were melted down into faceless gold bars and sent to Fort Knox. The government thought they had destroyed them all—but they were wrong. A few escaped, purloined in a crime—an inside job—that wasn't discovered until 1944. Then, the fugitive 1933 double eagles became the focus of a relentless Secret Service investigation spearheaded by the man who had put away Al Capone. All the coins that could be found were seized and destroyed. But one was beyond their reach, in a king's collection in Egypt, where it survived a world war, a revolution, and a coup, only to be lost again. In 1996, more than forty years later, in a dramatic sting operation set up by a Secret Service informant at the Waldorf-Astoria, an English and an American coin dealer were arrested with a 1933 double eagle which, after years of litigation, was sold in July 2002 to an anonymous buyer for more than $7.5 million in a record-shattering auction. But was it the only one? The lost one? Illegal Tender, revealing information available for the first time, tells a riveting tale of American history, liberally spiced with greed, intrigue, deception, and controversy as it follows the once secret odyssey of this fabulous golden object through the decades. With its cast of kings, presidents, government agents, shadowy dealers, and crooks, Illegal Tender will keep readers guessing about this incomparable disk of gold—the coin that shouldn't be and almost wasn't—until the very end.

When thieves hijack a collection of stuffed animals from a country auction, Frank and Joe Hardy pursue the getaway car and are drawn into a thrilling mystery. At the same time, the young detectives’ father—famed private investigator Fenton Hardy—is tracking down an industrial spy ring. This suspense-filled story of pursuit and detection will keep the reader breathlessly following the chain of unexpected developments that lead Frank and Joe to the spine-tingling climax in the wilds of Northern Canada.

Michael "Miles" Standish, vice president and senior grader of PCGS, presents an engaging history and coin-by-coin study of the famous Morgan silver dollar. Featuring the recollections of legendary dollar dealer John Love, beautiful high-resolution photographs of the Coronet Collection (ranked by PCGS as the "Number One Finest Morgan Dollar Set of All Time"), certified-coin populations, retail prices in multiple grades, and other valuable contents for collectors, investors, and history buffs alike.

The Big Problem of Small Change offers the first credible and analytically sound explanation of how a problem that dogged monetary authorities for hundreds of years was finally solved. Two leading economists, Thomas Sargent and François Velde, examine the evolution of Western European economies through the lens of one of the classic problems of monetary history--the recurring scarcity and depreciation of small change. Through penetrating and clearly worded analysis, they tell the story of how monetary technologies, doctrines, and practices evolved from 1300 to 1850; of how the "standard formula" was devised to address an age-old dilemma without causing inflation. One big problem had long plagued commodity money (that is, money literally worth its weight in gold): governments were hard-pressed to provide a steady supply of small change because of its high costs of production. The ensuing shortages hampered trade and, paradoxically, resulted in inflation and depreciation of small change. After centuries of technological progress that limited counterfeiting, in the nineteenth century governments replaced the small change in use until then with fiat money (money not literally equal to the value claimed for it)--ensuring a secure flow of small change. But this was not all. By solving this problem, suggest Sargent and Velde, modern European states laid the intellectual and practical basis for the diverse forms of money that make the world go round today. This keenly argued, richly imaginative, and attractively illustrated study presents a comprehensive history and theory of small change. The authors skillfully convey the intuition that underlies their rigorous analysis. All those intrigued by monetary history will recognize this book for the standard that it is.

Frank and Joe Hardy suspect that their best friend Chet Morton is the victim of a summer school swindle and offer to help get his money back. While probing a baffling burglary at the Seneca Indian Reservation in New York State they investigate Zoar College located nearby. A startling connection between the Zoar College swindle and the theft of the Seneca’s gold tribal relic Spoon Mouth propels the teenage sleuths into a series of perplexing and dangerous situations.

Stuart, Florida provides the setting for Federal undercover agent Mack McCray and a continuing cast of characters. A Spanish treasure galleon buried under thirty feet of beach sand by a hurricane in 1715 was uncovered in a 1949 hurricane. It was found by a hotel maid and handyman who hauled off nine chests of gold coins and melted them down for sale to local jewelers. They kept their find secret until Mack stumbled across them Assassins, double identities, retired strippers and a turkey buzzard named Napoleon intertwine in this spine-tingling thriller.