When I received my latest Lighthouse Legacy, after the first scan through, my attention focused on the Product History insert. I was shocked to see the large number of lighthouses that were retired at the end of 2001 and 2002 AND the dramatic reduction in the stated edition sizes. Example, #231 Esopus Medows. The edition size was reduced from 10,000 to 4,758. What happened to 5,242 lighthouses? Were they never made, or were they destroyed? This is just an example of many such changes. Is this an attempt on the part of HL to revive the secondary market? This does not follow the pattern of retiring lighthouses when orders equaled the stated production size or there was a problem. It looks like they adjusted the edition size to fit how many were sold at the end of 2001 or 2002.

Now on the other side. At the first Reunion each attendee was given the chance to buy 2 New Point Lomas lighthouses. The edition size was stated as 950. One miniature of the same lighthouse was given to each attendee. The edition size was stated as 480. These figures are in the HL Web Sight page 1997 Tables. Now five years later they say the edition size in 950! Where have the unaccounted for 470 miniatures been all this time? What is HL going to do with these miniatures? It sure changes the rarity of this item. Big bucks were paid for these first miniatures by people who did not attend the reunion. I heard that some attendees paid for their trip with what they made from selling both the full size and miniatures. Will there be a big drop in the secondary for the miniatures now that the word is out that the edition is is almost double what was originally stated? Another loss for collectors?

All this sounds like Enron creative accounting to influence the market.

It is getting late and I have to cover up plants. Hard freeze predicted for central FLODIDA.

Harry