Holabird Western Americana Collections

aka “HWAC” and “FHWAC”

The Holabird name in the company title draws its roots from Fred Holabird, company advisor, co-founder and the fun spirited auctioneer we’ve come to know and love. Fred Holabird has been presenting Americana auctions in Reno since 1984. From 2006-2014 Fred managed Holabird-Kagin Americana and headed up the production team that produced dozens of fixed price and auction catalogs with sales in excess of 16 million.

In 2012 Mr. Holabird co-founded new company, HWAC, to fill the needs of Americana collectors looking for rare and unique collectibles below the minimum lot prices of most larger auction houses. The goal of the company was to put the fun back in collecting and bring an array of noteworthy collectibles to Americana aficionados with all budgets.

When Holabird-Kagin Americana closed the Reno office in 2014, HWAC expanded their operations into the former Holabird-Kagin building and now bring some of the best and rarest collectibles at all price points to meet the needs of collectors everywhere.

HWAC is devoted to bringing collectors only the greatest Western Americana rarities, with an emphasis on western Americana mining collectibles, gold rush collectibles and numismatics. Under the leadership and direction of Fred Holabird—and assisted by the hardworking Reno HWAC office—we combine our efforts to bring you a unique piece of western American history in every item we sell and in every catalog we publish. It is our goal to ensure our clients the most accurate, detailed item descriptions and well-researched, historically factual backgrounds.

We specialize in buying, selling, and appraising western Americana, numismatica (coins, ingots, banknotes), exonumia (pioneer minor coinage/trade tokens), western antiquities, and railroad/mining goods. Our auctions typically feature wide selections of coins, tokens, stocks certificates, documents, photographs, assay certificates, postcards and other antiques and collectibles relating to western history, numismatics and mining, dating from c.1800 to c.1930. We hold many Americana and numismatic auctions each year inclusive of some of the greatest rarities extant, working personally with our clients to help them build significant collections. We have become known for our well-researched histories on the mining companies, historical figures, and mining districts of the items we sell. Here at Holabird’s Western Americana Collections, we not only set record-breaking sales prices at our auctions, but we create legends.