Q. David Bowers
Senator Adams: "You sold all those coins to dealers?"
Mr. Hoffecker: "No; to collectors. I let a few dealers have as many as 100 coins and some may have duplicated orders under another name."
Senator Adams: "What percentage of the coins went to dealers as distinguished from collectors?"
Mr. Hoffecker: "Not over 10 percent. I would not let dealers have as many as I did if I had not been a little scared at the start. If I had held the dealers down, I would have had more for the collectors; and I might say that I let some collectors have 10 or 15, but if I had held them down to five coins apiece, I would have had enough for all of them."
In Hoffecker's Own Words
Correspondence from L.W. Hoffecker to Walter P. Nichols, dated August 7, 1936, commented on the earlier distribution of Old Spanish Trail pieces as well as other matters:
"There is quite a bit of complaint about the collectors being called on to finance these issues [commemoratives in general] for the commissions. If a small collector wants to be sure of a few coins, it is up to him to put up the money as soon as he hears about them, but he should then be sure that he will get the coins. First come, first served. Every commission that I have had any correspondence with has been sadly disappointed about the local enthusiasm, or consumption, rather, of these coins. Every time I mentioned our coin here in town, I was called a highway robber for asking $2 for them. Our newspapers gave me plenty of coverage for three months, and I got 150 orders from residents of El Paso.
"After it became known that there was a premium on them, they had the nerve to come around and tell me that since they had been a long time friend of mine they were counting on me to save them some coins. Some of them got very sarcastic about it, but I was not peddling coins from door to door, nor guaranteeing them to increase in value ....
"I did not get in any trouble whatever with the Old Spanish Trail. I just handled it like I always have handled my private business. I kept track of how many coins I had sold every day, and when I had sold within 1,000 of what I expected to get, I stopped accepting orders. I was also careful when I saw the coins were selling well not to take too large an order from a dealer.
"I gave all the dealers all the coins they asked for the first time, but after that I refused to double any of their orders. With a thousand coins, I was able to take care of all emergencies, like different congressmen and senators, and the Department of the Mint, who wrote in asking for coins, and persons whom I was under obligation to, and if you are a subscriber to The Numismatist you will see how many favorable remarks have been made about the way that issue was handled."
L.W. Hoffecker had more to say to Nichols in a letter dated August 13, 1936:
"I got into an argument in New York over the Old Spanish Trail. A dealer advertised the coins for sale at auction two months before they were minted, and I objected to it, as a lot of people would have roasted me for giving dealers coins before they got them, and he got pretty hardboiled about it. My secretary suggested that we cut him off without any coins at all, but I immediately told her that I was financially responsible, that I had accepted his order in writing, and that he would have cause for action against me. To confirm my opinion, I took it up with my attorney, and he told me I had better make delivery, which I would have done anyway, as he could have told his story in print, and made it sound bad for me. I tried to smooth over everybody in handling the Old Spanish Trail issue, and think I succeeded very well. I had plenty of reasons for getting peeved and telling some of them something, but just forgot about it .... "
From L.W. Hoffecker's Files
The following excerpts from letters in L.W. Hoffecker's files (Plus an auction catalogue description) indicate that his stories were inconsistent concerning the "sellout" of Old Spanish Trail half dollars at the time of issue, and also give some interesting sidelights on the distribution of the pieces. (A selection from approximately 200 letters on the subject, from the Hoffecker-correspondence files in the Bowers and Merena Galleries Reference Collection.) Neither Mr. nor Mrs. Hoffecker, it would seem, would be candidates for an award for veracity:
NOT EVERYONE WANTED OLD SPANISH TRAIL HALF DOLLARS: A.H. Baldwin & Sons, Ltd., old-line London dealers, wrote to Hoffecker on August 6, 1935, as follows: "Thank you for your letter. We regret to say that 50-cent coins commemorating the opening of the Old Spanish Trail are of no use to us. Many thanks for offering them to us." This was a month before Hoffecker realized they would be "sold out," and the response was apparently in reply to a dealer solicitation.
GETTING READY TO FILL ORDERS: Letter from Hoffecker to John G. Harlan, September 17, 1935: "We will get the Old Spanish Trail coins the last of this week and we'll ship them all at one time."
SOLD OUT BY THE MIDDLE OF SEPTEMBER 1935: Letter from Hoffecker to A.D. Gutheil, February 25, 1936: "I am sorry to inform you that all of the Old Spanish Trail coins were sold by our committee in the middle of September, two weeks before we got them from the Mint, as they had been advertised for three months in the numismatic journals previous to that time. Most of the coins went to the collectors, the dealers getting very few, and no one locally bought any for resale .... All coins were sold by our committee for $2 each and postage."
LOCAL COLLECTORS EACH BOUGHT "JUST ONE OR TWO:" In response to Fred H. French, a Los Angeles collector who wrote on October 16, 1935, seeking a single Spanish Trail half dollar, Hoffecker wrote on October 21, 1935: "Replying to your letter of the 16th I would say I sold a few coins in Los Angeles which I expect are for resale. The El Paso people did not buy any in quantities; just one or two for keepsakes .... "
NONE FOR RESALE IN EL PASO: Letter dated March 10, 1936, from Hoffecker to John S. Maher, a Pennsylvania collector: "All of the Old Spanish Trail coins were sold by our committee by the middle of September as they had been advertised for three months in the numismatic journals .... No one in El Paso bought any coins for resale."