1919 half-dollar: sheet music.

[villa66]

x: In 1919—when this 1919 half-dollar was new—fifty cents was the price of the sheet music I’ve seen for a then-popular song, A Pretty Girl Is Like A Melody. It’s a tune mentioned by the former King Edward VIII in his 1951 book, A King's Story: The Memoirs of H.R.H. the Duke of Windsor K.G..

 

Prince Edward—as he was then, during his travels in 1919—had taken to humming A Pretty Girl Is Like A Melody after his visit to America, and it was a habit that his father King George V did not…well, did not find endearing. (93)

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[Burkhard]

Interesting story for this coin, probably the most beautiful in the entire American coinage, at least in the 20th Century. But speaking of Walking Liberties, it always come to my mind a quote in John Dos Passos' The 42nd Parallel, in which he states that raindrops falling to the ground are "as big as half-dollars". It's such a poetic comparison to me ?

[villa66]

Thanks for the good quote---I can see why it sticks in your mind. And I pulled one more snippet  from Edward's book that struck me as immensely sad, and revealing. But that'll wait for a minute. First I wanted to agree with your high opinion of the Walking Liberty half, and have another, better look at one...

 

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[villa66]

And now that snippet I took from Edward's book yesterday, accompanied by a piece of that superb copper-nickel the British were producing in the early-1950s. I wonder what they were doing...maybe giving the planchets some sort of special treatment? Anyway...

 

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x: A 1951 half-crown that was one of the coins and banknotes chased by a book from that year, A King's Story: The Memoirs of H.R.H. the Duke of Windsor K.G..

The United Kingdom was celebrating in 1951, and hope was widespread that the Festival of Britain would mark the end of the country’s tough postwar.

 

But Edward’s memoir—as memoirs often are—was more wistful than optimistic. Wrote the former prince, remembering himself as a young man: “At twenty-five this world, which to-day seems so vexatious, looked pleasant enough to a young Prince without too many cares, and with a battle-cruiser to take him around the world.” (92)

 

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[Burkhard]

Il 1/3/2020 alle 08:14, villa66 dice:

“At twenty-five this world, which to-day seems so vexatious, looked pleasant enough to a young Prince without too many cares, and with a battle-cruiser to take him around the world.”

Who can disagree? ?

[villa66]

Il 3/3/2020 alle 02:38, Burkhard dice:

Who can disagree? ?

Not me!

 

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