ACKERMAN, ERNEST ROBINSON

Ernest Robinson Ackerman (1863-1931), He was born in New York on June 17,1863, son of James Hervey Ackerman and Ellen Morgan.

According to the 1880 Census he was living with his father in Plainfield, New Jersey. He graduated Plainfield High School in 1880. From 1891 to 1892

he served as a councilman in Plainfield. In 1904 he worked for The Lawrence Cement Company – sales office located at No. 1 Broadway, Manhattan

and mailed a business envelope to the Chapman Brothers purchasing two coin auction copies of the Mills catalog for $5.58 in cash, one plain and one plated.

On October 17, 1900 he wrote to the Chapman Brothers requesting a copy of the Dr. Edward Maris catalogue while he lived at 506 West 8^th Street, Plainfield,

New Jersey.

From 1905 to 1911 he served as a state senator. In 1907 he bought more coins from Henry Chapman, Jr. Currently, there are four pieces of

correspondence from Ackerman to the Chapman Brothers catalogued in the Lupia Numismatic Library, Special Collection, The Chapman Family Correspondence

Archive. When the digital catalogue is completed for 1909 to 1931 the update on the total number of pieces of correspondence and a photograph or two shall

be posted. He was a Fellow of the ANS in 1908. Also, in 1908 he was a Republican delegate to the National Convention in Chicago. In 1915 his home was robbed. From 1916 to 1920 he was a member of the Board of Trustees at Rutgers University (then College). From 1919 to 1931 he served as the Republican Party representative in New Jersey’s 5^th

congressional district in the United States House of Representatives. In 1923 he sponsored a bill to permit illustration of postage stamps in a limited way. He died October 18, 1931. His coin collection was sold at auction by Charles H. Fisher on

June 27, 1931. A part of his valuable United States stamp collection was bequeathed to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Postal Museum in Washington, D.C.

Ackerman was named to the American Philatelic Society Hall of Fame in 2000.

Bibliography :

New England Philatelist, Vol. 5, No. 3, March (1915) : 97

Scott Monthly Stamp Journal,Vol. 4 (1923) : 73

ANA Membership List and Directory (1927) : 78

Stanley M. Bierman, M. D., The World's Greatest Stamp Collectors (New York : Frederick Fell Publisher, no date) : 231-239