Strength in Unity: Letter to the Editor

To: William GIbbs
Editor, Coin World Magazine

Sir,

I enjoyed Chris Bulfinch’s article Fasces on U.S. Coins in the October 29 edition. I’d like to expand on the symbolism behind this bundle of rods. To me, the fasces represents first and foremost the idea that there is strength in unity.  A single rod is easily broken, but a bundle of rods is very difficult to break. 

Viewed from this perspective, the fasces represented much more than authority and power. It was a potent symbol of ideals for citizenship and governance. We are stronger united than divided - an idea worth pondering in the midst of the bitter divisiveness that plagues our nation.  

“E pluribus unum” - from many, one. 

Image: Wikimedia

Pittsburgh Synagogue Shooting

A few days ago, a man named Robert Bowers killed 11 Jews in a Pittsburgh synagogue. News reports indicate that the shooter believed Jews are the "children of Satan". 

Most of us will agree that this is a thoroughly despicable point of view. But let's be clear about this: there is language in the New Testament that supports Bowers' vile belief.  In John 8:44, which Bowers cited in one of his social media posts, Jesus says to a group of Jews:

"You are from your father the devil, and you choose to do your father's desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him."  

I have no desire to attack Christian beliefs. But the fact remains that the New Testament contains statements such as the following which openly blame Jews for the death of Jesus. These are the roots of anti-semitism.

• John 7:1: "The Jews were looking for an opportunity to kill him [Jesus]."
• John 8:34: "Jesus answered them [the Jews]...' you look for an opportunity to kill me because there is no place in you for my word.'"
• John 11:53: "So from that day on they [the Jews] planned to put him [Jesus] to death."
• John 19:6: "When the chief priests and the [temple] police saw him [Jesus], they shouted 'Crucify him! Crucify him!' "
• John 19:14: "He [Pilate] said to the Jews: 'Here is your King!' They cried out 'Away with him! Away with him! Crucify him!' "
• Matthew 27:20: "Now the chief priests and the elders persuaded the crowd to ask for Barabbas and to have Jesus killed."
• Matthew 27:25: "Then the people as a whole answered, 'His blood be upon us and our children.'" This is perhaps the worst of all, extending guilt to all the descendants of the biblical Jews.

Mainstream Christian thinking has evolved on this matter, becoming more Jew-friendly. I know this because I was raised as a Christian, baptized and confirmed in the Episcopal faith. I was never taught that Jews are children of Satan, or killers of Christ, or inferior to Christians. In fact, quotes like the ones listed above were never mentioned at all. Biblical scholars offer various explanations for the anti-Jewish language in the New Testament, implying that it is not quite what it appears to be. James Carroll, in his excellent book Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews explores this in detail.

Yet these harsh words remain in the Bible, which some still believe is the literal word of God and the ultimate moral authority. It is no wonder this hatred is still with us today.

Except where noted above, all biblical quotes are from The New Oxford Annotated Bible, Fully Revised Fourth Edition, New Revised Standard Version. For those who prefer the King James version, John 8:44 reads, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do: he was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him."

Kavanaugh Nomination for U.S. Supreme Court

Today I sent this e-mail to both of my U.S. senators. Having resisted the temptation to post this on Facebook, this matter is still gnawing away at me to such a degree that I find it necessary to unleash it on the whole world in this blog.

Dear Senator, 

I am deeply concerned about the sexual conduct allegations that have been raised against Brett Kavanaugh. The Senate’s process for reviewing them seems to be seriously flawed. 

My concerns are as follows.

1. The FBI should investigate the allegations of Blaisey, Ramirez and Swetnick. The Senate should not vote in the Kavanaugh nomination until such investigations are complete. A hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee is not sufficient, given the severity of the charges, and the fact that Kavanaugh is being considered for a lifetime position on the highest court in the land.

2. Only one of the accusers (Blaisey) is appearing at tomorrow’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. What about the other two? Aren’t they entitled to have their concerns heard? 

3. Why hasn’t Mr. Michael Judge been called to testify before the Committee? He was allegedly a witness to the Blaisey incident. Surely his recollections are relevant. 

4. A Supreme Court justice should be a person of impeccable character and reputation. This is not a trial in which charges are dismissed and forgotten if the accuser cannot provide proof beyond a reasonable doubt. Ultimately, the allegations may be found to be unproven or unverifiable. But that sets the bar much too high, presenting the appearance of a Senate that hides behind the rules of evidence rather than doing what is best for our country. 

There are serious questions about the credibility of the Senate and its role with respect to Supreme Court nominations. If Kavanaugh’s candidacy survives and is brought to a vote, I urge you to use your judgment and vote your conscience. Set aside party politics for the good of the United States of America.

The Anomaly by Michael Rutger

This book ably works through a theme near and dear to me: that of hidden mysteries. 

The lead character is a jaded former screenwriter, now reduced to hosting a YouTube series on unexplained phenomena. He and his second-rate production team set forth to locate a cavern in a remote part of the Grand Canyon. Discovered by a 1909 expedition but long since forgotten, it's rumored to contain "wonders". 

The author, Michael Rutger, is a screenwriter by trade. Perhaps that's why he chooses to tell this tale using clever characters who constantly trade snappy dialogue. It's an odd choice given the subject matter of this tale. But the wry banter falls away whenever the action kicks in, which happens frequently. Rutger knows how to keep the pace moving along briskly. The Anomaly is a page-turner. I just kept reading it and reading it until there was nothing left to read. 

These virtues more than balance a couple of shortcomings. A couple of incidents are a bit too similar to certain popular movies (I won't name them, to avoid spoilers). And the author makes an effort to end most chapters with a cliffhanger phrased as a short, punchy sentence, which feels just a bit too manipulative. 

Don't be put off by the negative Kirkus review. The Anomaly is much better executed than Dan Brown's books. It's not as finely crafted as Jeff VanderMeer's Annihilation or John Langan's The Fisherman. But it's still a rattling good read for lovers of weird fiction and conspiracy theories.

An Inverted Jenny Stamp Surfaces

This rare stamp has been kept in safe deposit boxes for decades. It’s so valuable that the owner made the head of the Philatelic Foundation travel from New York to Chicago to take it out of its protective packaging. 

Link: New York Times, Sept. 8, 2018

An Inverted Jenny Surfaces. The Flawed Stamp Had Not Been Seen Since 1918.

No. 49 of 100 Jennies famously misprinted with an upside-down biplane was locked away in vaults for generations. The whereabouts of No. 66 remains unknown. 

Courtesy of New York Times

New York Bank Vault Hoard

Someone stored 16,000 Morgan silver dollars in a bank safe deposit box (picture in article) in 1964. They weren’t hidden or forgotten - rather, the hoard was inherited and passed on hand to hand for decades. Now the family is tired of paying for storage, so the silver dollars are coming to market. 

Based on silver content alone, these are worth nearly $190,000 (16,000 x $15/oz x 0.77344 oz.), but some are in mint condition and will be worth much more than the silver value.

Further Reading 

Gilkes, Paul. Hoard of 16,000 Morgan silver dollars to be graded, marketed. Coin World. June 8, 2018.

The Chicago Hoard: Backyard Discovery

This fellow hid his his coin and currency collection, then slipped into dementia and forgot about it. Since his death, his son has found portions of the collection all over the place: in the fireplace, under the front porch and buried in the back yard.

Family finds holdered 1876 Proof set buried in yard

Graders at CSNS authenticate eight-coin assemblage worth thousands of dollars

Coin World, May 4, 2018

Trump's Big Hoax

I promised myself I wouldn't post this on any social media, especially Facebook. It would only ignite a battle of duelling comments. I have decided to withdraw from that conflict for reasons explained in my "Facebook User Revolt" post dated April 17. But these thoughts keep bouncing around my addled brain, demanding release. And since almost nobody comments on this blog, I suppose I'm safe in venting here. 

After the events of the past week, it is abundantly clear to me that the President of the United States of America is incapable of running this country in an orderly fashion. 

This morning,  July 23, 2018,  Donald Trump made the following statement on Twitter:  

"So President Obama knew about Russia before the Election. Why didn’t he do something about it? Why didn’t he tell our campaign? Because it is all a big hoax, that’s why, and he thought Crooked Hillary was going to win!!!"

This is the latest in a series of disturbing events. Consider the following timeline. 

January 6, 2017: The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) issues the following statement:

"We assess Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency. We further assess Putin and the Russian Government developed a clear preference for President-elect Trump. We have high confidence in these judgments." 

February 16, 2018: A grand jury indicts three Russian companies and 12 Russian individuals for interference in the U.S. political system.

July 13, 2018: A grand jury issues another indictment of Russians for hacking offenses related to the 2016 presidential election.

July 16, 2018: Trump holds a news conference with Vladimir Putin in which he says U.S. intelligence sources "are telling me it's Russia... I have Vladimir Putin telling me it's not Russia... I don’t see any reason why it would be.” This seems to put the credibility of a Russian president on an equal footing with that of U.S. intelligence and the U.S. Department of Justice. Trump appears to favor Putin's version.

July 16, 2018: A 29-year-old Russian woman is charged with acting as an agent of Russia within the U.S. by infiltrating organizations having influence in American politics.

July 18, 2018: Trump retracts the July 16 statement.  He claims he misspoke. He meant to say “wouldn’t be,” not “would be.” It's painful enough to see the President all tangled up in his own underwear with such a statement. But it gets murkier when he goes on to say: 

"I accept our intelligence community's conclusion that Russia's meddling in the 2016 election took place. It could be other people also. A lot of people out there." 

In the first sentence he claims to believe the U.S. intelligence findings. But the next sentence seems designed to deflect the blame away from Russia. I'm not sure what all that adds up to. What does he really believe?

Today: That brings us to today's tweet, in which he says "it's a big hoax." Is he referring to the grand jury indictments, or the special counsel's investigation of his campaign? Is he reversing himself again?  

This man is impossible to pin down. He giveth with one hand, and taketh with the other. That's a very unfortunate trait in the leader of the most powerful nation on this planet. How can such a devious president work effectively with Congress, or with other heads of state? How can he be trusted by business leaders and investors who make decisions that affect the stability of our financial markets?

I have to look away now. Based on the amount of effort I've poured into writing this, and the following list of source materials, you can see why I had to deactivate my Facebook account.

Further Reading

Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Background to Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent U.S. Elections. January 6, 2017.

U.S. Department of Justice. Grand Jury Indicts Thirteen Russian Individuals and Three Russian Companies for Scheme to Interfere in the United States Political System. Press Release. February 16, 2018. 

Mueller, Robert S. Grand Jury Indictment of Internet Research Agency. Criminal charges filed in U.S. District and Bankruptcy Courts for the District of Columbia. February 16, 2018.

U.S. Department of Justice. Grand Jury Indicts 12 Russian Intelligence Officers for Hacking Offenses Related to the 2016 Election. Press Release. July 13, 2018. 

Mueller, Robert S. Grand Jury Indictment of 12 Russian Intelligence Officers. Criminal charges filed in U.S. District and Bankruptcy Courts for the District of Columbia. July 13, 2018. 

U.S. Department of Justice. Russian National Charged in Conspiracy to Act as an Agent of the Russian Federation Within the United States. Press Release. July 16, 2018.   

The Ghost Notebooks: A Novel

by Ben Dolnick
Pantheon Books, New York, 2018
Ebook ISBN 9781101871102

The Ghost Notebooks by Ben Dolnick
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I became so engrossed in this book last night that I read it until past midnight. When I woke up this morning, I finished it. I didn't even look at the newspaper.

I'm not interested in run-of-the-mill supernatural/horror/ghost stories. I've read plenty of them. But after reading the masters (Lovecraft, Machen, M.R. James, LeFanu and the like), I've become quite selective when it comes to this genre. I found this book very satisfying. It hit most or all of the right notes for my taste. The quality of the writing is comparable to what you'd expect in literary fiction, with well-developed main characters, interesting secondary players and insights into their inner lives. The quasi-supernatural aspect is nicely handled.


View all my reviews

A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

The characters in this novel are so unappealing that I nearly gave up on it a quarter of the way through. But then I read somewhere that it is a satire. Somehow that made it more interesting, and the story picked up speed, so I finished it. 

A quick overview of the plot, without spoilers: it's England in the 1930s. Lady Brenda has a title but no money. Her husband, Anthony, has no title but plenty of money, all of which is required to maintain their once-grand but now decaying stately home. Stranded in the countryside far from glittering London society, Lady Brenda is bored. She and her sister, Lady Marjorie, amuse themselves by cheating on their husbands. Lady Brenda takes up with idle young John Beaver, who has no title, no money, no job and no home of his own. Beaver lives with his mother, who makes her living selling overpriced interior decorating services to the aristocracy. Matters just get worse from there. 

At the conclusion of the novel, the reader gets an unexpected bonus: an alternate ending. You can take your pick. But both are pretty bleak, which comes as no surprise by the time you reach that point.  

The book includes several distasteful references to Jews and blacks. The most charitable interpretation is that Waugh is making a point about bigotry and racism, but given the context I doubt that's the case.  I think he's giving us a glimpse of his own prejudice. Setting that aside, I enjoyed A Handful of Dust. Think of it as a dark version of a P. G. Wodehouse story without the comic relief.  If you liked Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, you'll probably want to read this as well.  

Facebook User Revolt!

Let me be quite clear about this: these are the reasons I deactivated my Facebook account. 

1. I am troubled by Facebook's linkage, indirect or not, to Russia's interference in our presidential election.
2. I dislike Cambridge Analytica's use of my Facebook information to develop political micro-messaging. A politician with enough money to buy this data gains an edge over his opponents. Political campaigns ought to be conducted on a level playing field.
3. Due to its unfiltered nature, social media in general and Facebook in particular have become an ideal platform for the dissemination of alternative facts, half-truths and outright fake news. This is harmful to society, as it weakens trust in the legitimate media. 
4. Engaging in online political debates is sapping my energy and my tranquility. I am appalled to find out the politics of some of my friends -- educated and mature people that I thought I knew. Sometimes I can't resist the urge to set them straight. Then they fire back. I am weary of this conflict. 
5. My final issue is quite personal. I am a man with an active imagination and time on his hands. It was just too tempting to dream up clever posts and post them on Facebook. But that was only the beginning. I would keep checking to see how people reacted to my cleverness.  Then I'd react to their reaction, a vicious circle that can go on indefinitely. This is attention-seeking behavior. I'm embarrassed to say that I was so focused on obtaining the validation of others. It became too much a part of my daily routine, for no useful purpose. 

I realize that this blog is just another form of social media. Is it fair play to condemn Facebook while hoping people will read my blog? Am I saying that all social media is tainted, except for my blog? One could argue that this blog is simply another example of attention-seeking behavior.

I have to stop thinking about this now. It's all too much for me. Too much to bear. 

Killer Robot Weapons Lab

After watching the dreary Terminator: Genysis movie last night, I read a couple of articles (see links below) about the controversy surrounding "autonomous artificial intelligence weapons." These hypothetical weapons could be available soon, if those articles can be believed.

Photo courtesy of
The Doctor Who Experience.

In crude terms, these could be "killer robots" that seek and destroy without meaningful human control. Steven Hawking, Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak warned against the danger of developing such weapons several years ago. Back then, these noted geniuses believed the technology to deploy armed robotic "quadcopters" (such as those in the Terminator movie franchise) was only a few years away.

That was in 2015. It is now 2018.

If my arithmetic is correct, killer robots may be coming for us any old time now. How would you like to wake up in the middle of the night and find an autonomous artificial intelligence weapon rolling through your bedroom door, flashing and beeping and waving mechanical arms and squawking "Exterminate -- exterminate --" in a harsh electronic voice like a Dalek in a Doctor Who episode?

Let's work together, as Canned Heat counselled in their 1970 hit song. Team up with misfits, weirdos and hopheads. Hide out in cabins in the mountains. Get off the grid in shacks in the desert. Fight back against Daleks, robotic quadcopters or whatever the hell they are. Together we will stand, every boy, girl, woman and man, as ol' Bob "The Bear" Hite counselled nearly 50 years ago.

References

Canned Heat. Let's Work Together. YouTube video.

McLean, Asha. Researchers boycott Korean university over killer robot weapons lab. ZDNet. April 5, 2018.

Shalal, Andrea. Researchers to boycott South Korean university over weapons work. Reuters. April 4, 2018.

Anxiety-Wracked Dream

It’s always a mistake to write about your dreams. But as my readers (if there are any) know, I have never let that stop me in the past.  Anyone patient enough to read this lengthy account of last night's dream will be richly rewarded. It provides key insights into my past, my personality, and my unresolved neuroses. 

In this dream, which falls into the “back-to-school” category, I was confused and disorganized on the first day of school. I couldn’t figure out the names of the classes, or where the classrooms were. 

More than once, I told myself: “I have to get organized…ask someone for my schedule…figure this out…” But there was no time for any of that.  It was always time to move on to the next class.  I’ll do it on my lunch break, I decided.

Deciding to just go with the flow, I began taking notes. No luck there, because the lecture was moving too quickly. My pen didn’t work. Glancing down, I saw that my notes were all illegible scribbling. 

Doubts nagged at me, and paranoid suspicion too. Had the registrar perversely given me someone else's schedule? The classes were just too weird, tackling obscure fringe topics in an eclectic mixture of disciplines I couldn't pin down. A smiling female professor lectured while lying on the floor amidst a pile of pillows. Everyone else thought this was normal.  

Struggling to bring order to my confusion, I asked the person next to me: what class are we in? I also asked the faculty some pointed questions, such as: What is your name? How is this class going to benefit me? I couldn’t get clear answers.  

Then I asked a brusque professor: which department teaches this class? "History," he barked. I found myself trotting along beside this professor,  babbling “I love history. Always have. I wanna become a historian.” He gave me a sidelong glance and walked briskly away. Perhaps I’d been given at least one class I requested, I thought glumly. 

Finally, a pretty girl smiled at me and said “I’m so glad you’re going to be with us here at Columbia.” I marveled: I am a student at Columbia University. How did that happen?

Further Reading

Freud, Sigmund. The Interpretation of Dreams. Franz Deuticke, Leipzig and Vienna. 1899.

Roman Gold: The Norfolk Hoard

A husband-and-wife metal detectorist team recently found nearly 60 Roman coins buried in a farmer’s field in Norfolk. Six of them are gold and date to between 4 BC and 7 AD. 

Link

Norwich couple unearth valuable Roman coin hoard on Norfolk farm

Eastern Daily Press, March 22, 2018

The Uber/Lyft Experience

I'm an occasional driver for Uber and Lyft. On a whim, I turned on the app yesterday while I was driving around doing errands. I had one rider. He paid me $29 to take him to and from a methadone clinic. 

I spent 15 minutes parked outside the clinic, waiting to drive this man home on the return trip.  A steady stream of people seeking methadone came and went as I sat there. It was raining. 

These people need help, and  I feel obligated to help them. This is the third time I’ve taken someone

to or from a methadone clinic. I can’t say I feel comfortable doing it, but I rationalize it by telling myself I'm doing a good deed. It's somewhat like doing volunteer work and getting paid for it. 

But it doesn't pay much. In this case the round trip took about 2 hours, including wait time. That works out to $11.60 per hour before gas expense -- not much for a guy with two college degrees, and this was one of my better days on a per-hour basis. 

The Vianen Hoard

This hoard of about 500 gold and sliver coins was discovered by waterworks employees during excavation work in Holland:

15TH CENTURY POT OF GOLD FOUND DURING EXCAVATION NEAR DUTCH CITY

NL Times, March 1, 2018

courtesy of NL Times

The Voynich Manuscript

This isn't in the same league as the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred's Necronomicon, or the accursed The King In Yellow. But at least it actually exists. 

The Voynich Manuscript: Decode the World's Most Mysterious Book

Childrens' TV of the 1960s

Before senility robs me of these memories, I have assembled this list of lesser-known childrens' TV shows and short serials in the New York metropolitan area during the early 1960s.  In alphabetical  order:

• Bozo the Clown - made a friend of mine cry as a guest on his show
• Clutch Cargo - got a few seconds of screen time in Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction
• Ding Dong School - for the very young

• Diver Dan - never managed to hook up with Miss Minerva

• The Magic Land of Allakazam - blonde magician's assistant rode around on a toy train in tights and high heels
• Officer Joe Bolton -  always ended the show with "It's time for all good little boys and girls to go to bed"

• Romper Room - with Mr. Do Bee

• Soupy Sales - before he was a game show guest
• Sandy Becker - Norton Nork and Hambone characters were downright weird
• Shenanigans - with Stubby Kaye, who had quite a career before and after 
• Space Angel - I liked his sidekick Taurus 
• Tommy Seven - "your favorite TV clown" had a magic nose
• Wonderama - host Sonny Fox went on to become a producer in film and TV

This list would not be complete without these highlights from the original Mickey Mouse Club show. Although it doesn't fit my "lesser-known" criteria, it was definitely my favorite, in part due to: 

• Mouseketeer Darlene Gillespie, my very first crush - I would have died of embarrassment if anyone suspected back then, but now it can be told.
• The serials, especially The Adventures of Spin and Marty, The Hardy Boys: The Mystery of the Applegate Treasure and Annette

Mouseketeer Darlene Gillespie

It was my fondness for these shows that lead my parents to impose restrictive "TV watching hours." The rules were taped to the television set in the basement. But that is another story. 

Links

These two web sites are simply outstanding, comprising the deepest dive into their subjects I've ever seen. 

New York City Local TV Shows Roundup

The Original Micky Mouse Club Show

Strange Things

I want to be clear on this: I don't believe these things. But they are strange.

• Jimmy Carter, Henry Kissinger and other public figures are in fact dead and are being impersonated by "organic robotoids," according to attorney and financier Peter David Beter. 
• There is a longstanding theory that the Earth is hollow, with access points to the interior at the north and south poles.
• Horror fiction author Whitley Streiber claims that non-human "visitors" to his secluded cabin in upstate New York changed his life forever. 

  

  Ball lightning

• The existence of ball lightning has been debated for centuries.
• A drilling project delved so deep that it reached Hell, according to The Well to Hell hoax. 
• Mel's Hole, an allegedly bottomless pit in the state of Washington, was the subject of a 2008 art exhibit curated by LA Times art critic Doug Harvey.
• The Emerald Tablet, an ancient alchemical treatise, was supposedly discovered in a vault beneath a statue of the god Hermes in Tyana, Turkey, where a corpse on a golden throne held the tablet.  

If you have your own strange story, I'd love to hear about it.

Further Reading

Beter, Peter David. Index of Audio Newsletters. www.peterdavidbeter.com.

Biblioteca Pleyades. http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/esp_tema.htm

Coast to Coast AM Radio: The Latest Paranormal News. https://www.coasttocoastam.com

Colby, C.B. Strangely Enough. Scholastic Paperbacks. 1963.

Streiber, Whitley. Communion - A True Story. Avon. 1987.

The Cridling Stubbs Hoard

Now in display at Leeds City Museum, this hoard of copper coins lay buried in a Yorkshire field for over 1,600 years. Experts believe it may have been hidden around 346 AD to keep it safe from Irish and Saxon raiders.

Copper load of this! Ancient coin stash at Leeds City Museum 

Yorkshire Evening Post, February 1, 2018

The Ring-A-Ding UFOs

By Bob Tralins
Belmont Books. 1967. Paper.

“Ring-a-ding” was an expression popularized by Frank Sinatra and his Rat Pack pals. How did it end up being combined with UFOs and a tied-up woman in go-go boots on the cover of this 1967 spy novel? That was a stroke of marketing genius.

The Ring-A-Ding UFOs was the third in a series featuring femme fatale Lee Crosley, aka The Miss From S.I.S. She also appeared in an eponymously titled book and The Chic Chick Spy, both published in 1966.

Other works by author Bob Tralins (and there were many) include 5 Wild Dames, Primitive Orgy (both published in 1961; the guy was a writing machine), Law of Lust (1962) and Jazzman in Nudetown (1964).  Based on the titles alone, they remind me of the cheap paperbacks my father kept in the basement when I was a child. 

Further Reading 

Allmusic Guide. Ring-a-Ding-Ding! by Frank Sinatra.
FantasticFiction.com. List of Books by Robert Tralins.
PulpCovers.com. Pulp Covers: The Best of the Worst. 
Wikipedia. Robert Tralins. 

Dow 3000

by Thomas Blamer and Richard Shulman
Wyndham Books, 1982; 206 pages
ISBN 0-671-43224-9

When Dow 3,000 was published in 1982, it was advertised in the back pages of The Wall Street Journal, where dubious books about economic collapse, market timing and investing in gold were often promoted.  As the title implies, it predicted that the Dow Jones Industrial Average would increase to around 3,000. The index was around 1,000 at the time, so achieving that prediction would require it to triple.  

With the hubris of youth, I told my friends that this was ridiculous.  I had recently earned a bachelor’s degree in finance, so I was pretty confident I knew what I was talking about. Here, it seemed, was yet another case of overreach by financial advisors who would push the envelope unmercifully to get customers to buy stocks. 

Dow 3,000 is long out of print, but I recently picked up a used copy. It's my way of keeping myself humble, because the 3,000 I scorned so long ago seems ridiculously small compared to where the index closed today: just over 26,000. 

I spent an interesting afternoon paging through this book recently. To my surprise, it's far from being promotional. It's actually a careful analysis based on fundamental valuation methods and a seven-year forecast horizon: Dow 3,000 by year-end 1989. 

Readers of my generation will recall the horrendous conditions in place when this book was written. In late 1980, when the manuscript was submitted for publication, U.S. markets were in turmoil, beset by double-digit inflation.  30-year Treasury bond yields were in the 12% to 14% range. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was trading well below its book value, and at less than 8 times earnings.

In this bleak landscape, Blamer and Shulman did a two-pronged valuation analysis. 

• Method #1 was a price-to-book value analysis. The authors presented historical data showing that over long periods, the Dow tended to trade at or above "inflation-adjusted" book value. (Note the focus on inflation, which is everywhere in this work.)  Then they projected the inflation-adjusted book value of the index seven years into the then-future, based on assumptions about return on book value, dividend payout and retained earnings. Result: a projected book value of 3,150. Assuming the market would eventually trade at a price-to-book value ratio of 0.95, it's easy to get to Dow 3,000 with this valuation method.
• Method #2 was a price/earnings forecast. Blamer and Shulman assumed that the price-earnings multiple for the Dow would eventually return to a level consistent with its 60-year average, and that the earnings of the Dow Jones companies would rise in line with inflation. Applying a P/E multiple of 14 to their earnings forecast, they projected the value of the Dow to be around 3,400 by year-end 1989. They then presented an earnings forecast for each of the companies in the index. 

So there you  have it: Dow 3,000 within seven years, supported by two conventional valuation methods. What I thought was stockbroker overreach was actually a nicely reasoned case for multiple expansion and regression to the mean: price/book and price/earnings ratios would eventually return to levels more in line with long term historical averages, driven by a return of confidence. 

Of course the devil is in the details. Blamer and Shulman's forecast assumed an 8% annual inflation rate. That's understandable in light of what was going on when the book was written. But the actual inflation rate turned out to be 3.7% over their forecast period. So something else must have happened to offset that faulty assumption, because the authors of Dow 3,000 came very close to being right about the stock market recovery. Although the Dow Jones Industrial Average did not reach 3,000 by year-end 1989, it did so the following year. In the treacherous realm of market forecasting, that's a fine outcome.  

But what I marvel at is how far the index has climbed since then. As noted previously, the Dow closed at around 26,100 yesterday. An investment of $1,000 in the Dow at year-end 1981, just before Dow 3,000 was published, would be worth an eye-popping $29,832 today. That's a compound annual return of 9.86% for 36 years.

I am humbled. All those years ago, if I’d thought it out carefully and applied what I’d learned in my finance classes, it would have been apparent that "Dow 26,000" was within reach over a 36-year forecast horizon. Regrets aside, this is a great example of the power of compound growth. If you can grow something – anything -- at 9.86% per year for 36 years, you’ll get an amazing result at the end of the line. 

Historical data courtesy of Macrotrends.net: 

•  Inflation
• 30 Year Treasury Yield

Birthday Numerology: The Power of 64

Today is my 64th birthday. This has opened my eyes to many things. I've come to the realization that 64 is a special number. A number great and powerful, like the Wizard of Oz. 

If you divide 64 in half, the result is 32. If you continue the process as far as possible, the result is always a whole even number until you reach the number 1, as shown below: 

• 64/2 = 32
• 32/2 = 16
• 16/2 = 8
• 8/2 = 4
• 4/2 = 2
• 2/2 = 1. 

The fact that you can extend the sequence shown above all the way back to the number 1 is impressive, at least to this blogger. To the ancient Greeks, the number 1 symbolized the first thing that came into existence when the universe was created. Ancient numerologists believed the number 1 represented the origin of all things. All numbers can be produced by adding 1, and only 1, to itself. For example, 3  = 1+1+1. For certain monotheistic religions, 1 represents God.

The divided-by-two sequence works because 64 is a doubly even (or evenly even) number, which means it is divisible more than once by 2.  A doubly even number is even and its quotient when divided by 2 is also even.

Viewed from another angle, 64 can be expressed as: 

• 8 to the second power = 64. Therefore, 64 is a square number (8 x 8).  A matrix with 8 rows and 8 columns contains 64 squares. That is the number of squares comprising a chess or checker board. 
• 4 to the third power = 64. Therefore, 64 is also a perfect cube (4 x 4 x 4). 
• 2 to the fifth power = 64. I am still groping for the meaning of that one.  

These ideas are not original. The Pythagoreans believed that we live in a world of numbers, i.e. that all things are made up of numbers and "are ruled by mathematical constancies and regularities," as Will Durant said (see Further Reading below).  All odd numbers were believed to be masculine, and even numbers feminine. The number 5 symbolized marriage because it is the sum of the first odd number and the first even number (2 + 3 = 5).

"The so-called Pythagoreans, who were the first to take up mathematics, not only advanced this subject, but saturated with it, they fancied that the principles of mathematics were the principles of all things." Aristotle, Metaphysics 

"The most important and first study is of numbers themselves: not of those which are corporeal, but of the whole origin of the odd and even and the greatness of their influence on the nature of reality." Plato, Epinomis

"The best-known instance of numerology is the “number of the beast,” 666, from the biblical Revelation to John (13:18). Curiously, Revelation is the 66th book in the Bible, and the number of the beast occurs in verse 18, which is 6 + 6 + 6. " Encyclopedia Britannica, Number Symbolism

My brain is whirling, on fire with numbers. So many numbers. The year ahead is going to be a great one, driven by the power of 64, because today is my 64th birthday.  But wait - the year ahead is actually my 65th year of life. Last year was my 64th year of life.  Perhaps last year was my special year and I didn't even notice it. Patterns and mysteries can be found wherever you seek them, if you just search hard enough. Whether those patterns mean anything, I cannot say.

Further Reading

Durant, Will (1953). The Story of Philosophy. New York: Simon and Schuster.

Hall, Manly P. (2003). The Secret Teachings of All Ages. New York: Penguin Group.

Michel, John (1971). The Dimensions of Paradise: Sacred Geometry, Ancient Science, and the Heavenly Order on Earth. United Kingdom: Garnstone Press

Stewart, Ian. Number Symbolism. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved from https://www.britannica.com/topic/number-symbolism#ref849704 January 17, 2018.

Wikipedia. The Number 64. Retrieved from  
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/64_(number) January 2, 2018.