EXTENSIVE USE has been made by the compiler of both primary and secondary sources of information. Primary sources included manuscripts and data obtained from artists and manufacturers.

Secondary sources included published biographical data on the artist, numismatic references on the objects, background or historical material on either a particular item or the artist, or books on the subject of a coin or medal (in addition to some unpublished book manuscripts the compiler was given access). All these references are found at the end of each artist's entry as either “BIOGRAPHICAL RESOURCES.” or “NUMISMATIC RESOURCES.”

The NUMISMATIC RESOURCES citations will document the entries listed above. Catalog numbers of items, for example, will be given here with the citation to the book or article that listed these (and the page number where that item is found).

These references were chosen for the useful content they provide a researcher. Authors of books or articles can use this reference material for additional information, for checking facts of an artist’s life or his work, perhaps for genealogical data, or for many other uses.

Thus consider this book a master index. It leads the reader to a greater body of information elsewhere on the artist or on the items listed. Its usefulness is in bringing together in one place the total bas-relief work of all American artists for all time. This is done for each artist, and to list this bas-relief work in its final form – coin, medal, whatever in one of 30 categories. These, in turn, are arranged chronologically. The bas-relief life work of each artist is evident from this form of listing.

Too few archive sources are listed. These are widespread among libraries and archives of all kinds. The papers of the Frasers – James Earle and Laura Garden – are at Syracuse University in Syracuse, New York. Many of their models and finished works are at the Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City. Sculptor-medallist Theodore Spicer-Simpson donated his studio collection of all his medallic work to the Miami University Library (the compiler was privileged to examined these on a trip to Miami). This is an area that requires additional effort in the future.

The major source of artists’ primary documents is the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, a branch of the Smithsonian.                        

All references lead the reader to the Bibliography at the back of the book. The reader will note this bibliography is different from any other. Divided in two classes, biographic and numismatic, all works are arranged in topical outline form – often with annotations or remarks about the content of the work.

All works – books, articles, videos – are arranged in related topics and given a number (in effect, the compiler has cataloged these works) like a library call number. Also within each topic the arrangement is chronological. These are arranged by the first year the work was published.

This multiple-element citation system is used throughout the book. Thus a citation always includes the bibliography-resource number in boldface, the first year of publication in brackets and the author's last name. After that may appear page numbers and other elements to amplify the citation.

The author anticipates some concern among users of this directory. Those who are researching numismatic items are, perhaps, wondering why so many sculptural items – reliefs and bas-reliefs – are included. Conversely, researchers who are searching sculptural items may be concerned they must wade through such vast amount of numismatic material.

The answer lies with the change of technology at the beginning of the 20th century. Diestruck numismatic items were once the sole prerogative of hand engravers and diesinkers. After 1900 (generally) numismatic items were created more so by those artists specializing in bas-relief; it was the sculptors who created the oversize relief patterns from which the design was then reduced and the dies cut by machine to the intended size.

While the equipment for this machine engraving technology had been in America Since 1836 (date of the importation of the Contamin pantograph at the U.S. Mint), it was not until the first Janvier pantograph was imported into the U.S. (1902) that this major shift in coin and medal creation conclusively transferred from hand engravers to sculptors of oversize patterns, from handcut dies to machine cut dies, from craftsmen to artists.

Reason for bas-reliefs, created prior to 1900, to be included in this directory was based on the fact these could, and many were, made into medallic reliefs (by foundry casting or electrocasting). These forms are considered within both fields of numismatics and sculpture.  Thus all are listed (and our sympathies extend to harried researchers).

This total compilation is ideal for the collector of Americana. Medal collectors will recognize this book as perhaps the largest such listing of numismatic Americana published anywhere.

Americana is defined as American themes or subjects, or by American artists.  Related items are often included. Americana is a collecting topic. (In England this is called thematic.)

This list forms three functions for the topical collector: (1) it is an ideal list for anyone who wishes to form a new topic to collect, (2) or it will help select that area within Americana if the person wishes to specialize, to collect only a portion of this large area (only the collector himself can define his own collecting topic), and (3) it can furnish addition information on selected individual items.

The author is most delighted to furnish this useful information to anyone who seeks it.  Efficaci Do Manus Scientiae.