Comments on "Willem Vis, Coin Designer"

[Pabitra]

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Willem Vis, Coin Designer

A small set of queries

Were these Netherland Antilles coins issued? I am sure that they were collector coins, if issued at all. What sort of mintage?
Were they minted at Royal Dutch Mint?
How many coins were there in the series? 17 are shown. Were there more of them?

[eurocoin]

A small set of queries

Were these Netherland Antilles coins issued? I am sure that they were collector coins, if issued at all. What sort of mintage?
Were they minted at Royal Dutch Mint?
How many coins were ther in the series? 17 are shown. Were there more of them?

Yes they were issued and are indeed collectors coins, the mintage lays around 440-560 per coin.
They never got sold out and the Royal Dutch Mint, who indeed minted them, still sells them on their eBay account.
There were 24 I believe however those that aren't shown yet are rare and I don't have decent pics of them.

[Figleaf]

Solomon Islands, 100 Dollars, 1992. 50th anniversary of the battle of the Guadalcanal.

The ship is admiral Callaghan's flagship, San Francisco. I think the design was made on the basis of the picture shown. The newspaper cut off the top of the foremast and it is missing on the coin too. I suppose Mr. Vis didn't notice. The fighters are an odd fantasy. The battle was fought in the dark. Neither side had air cover, as contemporary fighter planes were not equipped to operate at night. As you can read, the picture was taken just before the ship was scrapped. A far cry from the first battle of Guadalcanal.

In the words of admiral Nimitz: There followed a half hour melee which for confusion and fury is scarcely paralleled in naval history. Both formations broke and the engagement became a series of individual ship duels with each side from time to time firing at its own vessels. War is seldom heroic and often chaotic.

Peter

[eurocoin]

It's correct that the foremast has been longer but I believe both the coin and the newspaper article are right. I think that due to damage or something a piece snapped of, although I couldn't find a 100% match in the records of the ship.
Mr. Vis always used a ton of documentation so you may very well be right that he used the image shown above.

See here in 1935:



And than in 1942:



Between these 2 dates there are no photos or records of the ship so it may be that it was the Japanese plane that crashed into the ship who damaged the mast but, without documentation of 7 years in which the ship was part of many battles, there is no way to know that for sure.

Here a photo of the plane crash that is pictured on the coin (it's the ship in the middle):

[Figleaf]

The action took place in November between 01:45 and 02:26 AM. There is no way anyone could have made pictures at that hour. In those days, night pictures required that the camera be held perfectly still during a very long exposure (you may have seen pictures with car lights of invisible cars becoming stripes across the pictures. That's how moving objects appear on such photographs.) The pictures you see (including the one with the APA in the centre) were taken the next morning. A full description of the battle is here. No ship was hit by aircraft until dawn, around 08:00 AM.

San Francisco's war record is here. There is no mention of repairs after Guadalcanal. She was fired at again only once, during the battle of the Philippine sea, but suffered no damage. In this lemma is a picture of San Francisco in 1945. She sports on modern radar installation on her reconstructed foremast, which she didn't have in 1942. Maybe the newspaper cut off the mast to hide the radar. Note also that the newspaper photo and the coin show the bridge after repair of damage in the naval battle of Guadalcanal.

Peter

[Figleaf]

I thought I'd take a closer look at the other Guadalcanal designs. The fighter plane on this design is a P-39 Airacobra, which is the correct plane to show for this time and place. However, the paint job is like that of the more famous P-40. Moreover, Mr. Vis seems to have missed the rear window of the cockpit. The P-40 did not have a rear window, but the P-39 did. In view of Mr. Vis' age, I wonder if he was having the sort of vision problems I have...

Peter

[eurocoin]

Why do you think it isn't a P40 ?

[Figleaf]

The P-39 has a nose wheel, the P-40 a tail wheel.

Peter

[eurocoin]

Yes you are right, I think it's the P39 with the painting (It doesn't match 100% with the P40 Shark mouth painting, as that always ends in 1 point), and he indeed forgot the rear window of the cockpit.

[eurocoin]

Today I found images of the original sketches of the 250 Francs coin of Belgium that Willem Vis designed in 1998 to commemorate the 70th Anniversary of queen Fabiola. I noticed that the writing of "Boudewijn", the name of the ruling monarch at the time, is written differently on the sketch than on the realised coin. Also it is clear that where the I in Vis's sketch stood, on the realised coin still remains a space. Searching on the internet I only found "Baldvini" as the right translation (and form) for Boudewijn (as on the sketch). Any thoughts on this ?



Baldvin



Baldvini

[<k>]

In Google UK, only Baldvin comes up, and then as an Icelandic name. The Latin translates as "A memorial of the King Boudewijn". Baldvini would mean, "of Boudewijn". It's a linguistic question. Because "regis" (genitive case) means "of the king", should "Baldvin", which is a predicate of "regis", also be in the genitive case? The coins shows "Baldvin", which is supposedly the nominative case (subject). However, it should really be "Baldvinus", and I have found "Baldvinus" on the internet. My opinion: Baldvin is wrong. I'm not sure whether the correct word, grammatically, should be Baldvinus or Baldvini.

Nominative case, genitive case: Rex, Regis: the king, of the king.

Nominative case, genitive case: Gaius, Gaii: Gaius, of Gaius. So the Latin version of the king's name should end in "us" or "i", depending on the required grammatical case.

[bgriff99]

It's correct that the foremast has been longer but I believe both the coin and the newspaper article are right. I think that due to damage or something a piece snapped of, although I couldn't find a 100% match in the records of the ship.

The mast is to support wireless aerials.   It was shortened before the war, with what looks like radar equipment added.

[chrisild]

The coins shows "Baldvin", which is supposedly the nominative case (subject). However, it should really be "Baldvinus", and I have found "Baldvinus" on the internet.

Quite interesting - I just noticed that the Schön catalog (I have the 2014 edition) has an image of the BALDVINI "coin".   Sent him a note ...  In 1960 Belgium issued a wedding coin that has his name as BALDVINVS - nominative, with Latin(ized) nominative. So they could have done it similarly in 1998, using the genitive. Would have been better in my opinion too.

Maybe this was some kind of compromise. For example, the "Latin" inscription on coins from the UK says ELIZABETH while (medieval) Latin documents usually prefer ELISABETH/A. (Besides, the spelling "Balduin" is perfect German. )

Christian

[eurocoin]

Interesting, please keep us informed about the reply of Mr. Schön.
I saw that in 1996 a coin was issued to commemorate the King Boudewijn Foundation.
The lettering was FVNDATIO REGIS BALDVINI so in the genitive.
I still wonder how it was possible that they just left out 1 letter. The design was very clear I guess.

[eurocoin]

Mr. Vis was a frequent contributor to Weltmünzkatalog, maybe the image is a copy of one of his original designs.
I asked Mr. Schön about it twice but I unfortunately never received a reply to my question.