I just recently purchased a catalog of the auction of the Irwin Goodman collection of Russian coins, mostly dated pre-1917 and almost exclusively silver coins. The catalog is entirely in Russian. Although there is no indication of who published it or the date of publication, the contents lead me to believe that it was published shortly after the auction of this collection (February 1991) but before the Soviet Union split up and became Russia + independent states (previously "autonomous republics").

I'm sure that anyone who has been collecting Russian coins for longer than I have (only about a year and a half) will know about this collection and the auction. It is quite impressive. The collector is/was Canadian/American, amassed an incredible collection of Russian and Chinese coins as owner of a furniture store (or factory?) in California, and became one of the most "voracious" auction purchasers in history.

According to the Russian introduction, he regularly attended auctions all over the world during his business trips, and at one of the important Sotheby's auctions of Russian coins in 1969 in Europe, he apparently bought just about every 2nd lot! He always attended the auctions in person and never used a proxy bidder.

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