For two weeks I was planning another article for the week, but that collapsed on Thursdaymorning. I am falling back on a project I worked on earlier in the week.

In 1995, ANA President Ken Bressett appointed me chair of the ANA Awards Committee. I havemaintained an interest over the years. I try to post the awards to the individual entries inAmerican Numismatic Biographies.

Each year the ANA sends out a request for award nominations. Many of the awards are forservice to the ANA. Often a retiring board member will get a Glenn Smedley Memorial Award,if nothing else.

There are others who are honored for service at the local level, a regional level or for a specialtyclub. Some clubs take advantage of the opportunity to nominate their club members. Some clubsnever nominate anyone. Thus the results are uneven. People who are equally deserving of anaward are left out for lack of a nomination.

Nominations require a description of past service to the hobby. People who submit a nominationoften consult with the person to assemble that list. In other cases the person receiving the awardwrites the nomination and submits it through a willing helper.

If you know someone who deserves an ANA service award, consider making the effort to submita nomination.

The original Krause Publication Numismatic Ambassador Award often was given to showpromoters with long service to their club. Frequently the names would be unfamiliar and I had toscramble to provide a biographical listing. If the person has a common name, I might not be ableto figure out a biography.

This past week I posted the results from the 2025 Coin World List of 100 Most Influential Peoplein Numismatics. I am often amused and sometimes confounded with the results.

It is clear to me that the emphasis is on commercial numismatics with little interest innumismatic education.

In the original 2020 list, Q. David Bowers and Ken Bressett were on their Top 10 list. By 2025,they were both off the list, Sorry guys, you are no longer influential.

The 2024 list had a category for Researchers/Authors. This included the influential David T.Alexander, Ken Bressett, Roger W. Burdette, Beth Deisher, Tom Delorey, Bill Fivaz, Ron Guth,R. W. Julian, and Joel Orosz. They were all dropped from the 2025 list.

New to the list this year are Ralph and Phyllis Ross, listed as a family. Ralph was not consideredinfluential when he was ANA president. Tom Uram is listed but he is noted as past president ofthe Pennsylvania Association of Numismatists rather than as past president of the ANA.

In the past I commented that Coin World advertisers had a strong chance of being consideredinfluential. I looked at the June monthly issue of Coin World. I found that 25 of the mostinfluential people were connected to ads in that issue.

The Coin World list has been criticized for ignoring foreign numismatists. Ulrich Künker of theGerman auction firm made the list for the fifth year. They have a full-page ad in the June issue.

I think the Coin World list has a value if you recognize it for what it is. If you think ofNumismatics as an industry, it tells you who are the big players.

For more information on the ANA service awards, see:
Awards Categories and Nomination Forms(https://www.money.org/service-awards-categories/)