Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Discussion - Member to Member Sales - Research Center
Most of these "fakes" were made pretty easily, just by drawing a heavy line of ink across the word SPECIMEN. Most "stamp gatherers" as we were called then were not interested in the overprinted stamps but a used stamp was another story. I would guess that this practice of faking used stamps continued until the turn of the century, as when closely examined, some of these mutilated stamps are the wrong color, and or paper. In thier greedy quest, these neferious folks have destroyed or at least altered scarce and sometimes, rare stamps.
For my first example, I'll discuss this "used" O51. I don't really know when an O51 became more sought after than an O51s, although I do have a 1928 Scott and a 1932 Scott, they are both World Catalogues, my earlist Scott Specilized is a 1940 edition, which lists both a mint O51 and a used O51 at $4.00, and an O51s at $20.00
Of the regular stamp, there were 38, 200 issued, the O51s was a mere 177 copies. Looking closely at the stamp, you will notice that there is a line through the left half of the O in POST, it looks like a fiber as the crosshatched background shading is disturbed all the way to the unprinted inner oval. Another fiber crossed the lower label border and is showing on the left of the S of POST. Now, if that is a constant plate variety, there are possibly 382 copies of that variety on the regular stamp, but only 2 of them could exist on O51s.One less rarity!
Some of the "alterations" were convincing, as this "used O10" is at first glance, but wait! Its the wrong color! The only 1 cent Executive that was that color is the third printing American Bank Note Company's O10 xs, and sure enough when examined with the powerfull Wolfe binonular microscope ( 200X - 400X ) faint traces of the overprint are visible through the blue quatered cork, which is another clue, there are no blue cancelattions on Executive stamps. The stamp was only used in two places, Washington,DC and the Presidents summer home in Long Island, NY.
When I first saw this stamp on ebay, I knew immediatly that it was faked, but wanted it for my Fake reference collection. As soon as the stamp arrived I scanned it at 1200 dpi, and then email the seller, telling him what I had found ( what I knew I was going to find ) and attached a copy of my scan to my email, asking for a return of my money, and then explained that I did want to but the stanp but not at the hammered down price. The next day I got an email agreeing to my offer. 4,652 copies of this stamp were sold, and there is an error in the printing, the Broken I. Can't tell if this is one of the 46 or 47 errors.
This last one was harder to spot, It also is the wrong color, but the difference is subtle. It is also the wrong paper, this time from the forth printing, again an American printing Sc O57 xs. Luckly there were no errors in this printing, other than the mismatched type size that is one of the identifing traits of this stamp, but again, that is hidden from us. Only 1,672 copies were sold.
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What a pleasure to read the info presented. Good job!
Best,
Dan C.
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littleriverphil,
Thanks for the informative presentation!!!
Can you tell me if there are any items in my official section that warrant a closer look?
http://www.larsdog.com/stamps/bob.htm
Thanks!
Lars
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Thank you Dan. 
"Can you tell me if there are any items in my official section that warrant a closer look?"
Nothing that looks altered, although I'd check O38 for the "Line through the N" variety, can't see the dollar values well enought to tell if they are the German "Facsimilies" and, on O88, is that a wreath fort cancel?
Here is one of the Gereman facsimilies, a convincing fake purple cancel is hiding the printed FACSIMILE on the lined panel between DEPARTMENT OF and STATE that has been partially scraped away. Notice that the lined panel is disturbed and does not show the 5 green lines that it should. I suspect that the crease was deliberate, done to lend some credibilty to it being used. I've also uploaded a scan of my Snef ( German ) facsilime that has an additional FACSIMILE handstamp in purple.
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"Nothing that looks altered, although I'd check O38 for the "Line through the N" variety"
I see that listed in my Scott Specialized, but it doesn't change the CV much so I'm not concerned about that one.
"can't see the dollar values well enough to tell if they are the German "Facsimilies""
If, by dollar values, you mean O68-71, I have certs on O68 and O71. O69 and O70 are proofs. I wouldn't buy ANY O68-O71 without a cert!
"on O88, is that a wreath fort cancel?"
This one, one the other hand, really makes a difference in value! I don't know what a fort cancel is. Where can I learn more?
Thanks for the feedback!!!
Lars
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"This one, one the other hand, really makes a difference in value! I don't know what a fort cancel is. Where can I learn more?"
"One of the romantic and historically fascinating aspects of Untider States official stamps is the use of War Department stamps at forts established to protect the Western settlement routes from Indian depredations. Alan C. Campbell "
The above quote from Alan C. Campbell is the opening sentance in his 11 page article on the Killers of Fort Levenworth in Volume: 53 Number: 1 Year: 2001 Chronicle 189, avaible here on The U.S. Philatelic Classics Society "Web Chronicle" page. ( select issuse 189 )
http://www.uspcs.org/resource-center/chronicle-information/web-chronicle/
SON Fort Cancels command high prices and there are major collections of them. Even a partial can bring premiums. Most are CDS duplexed with a killer, some are fancy as the mentioned atricle will tell you more about. In my own collection I have several partial forts and a couple of son Agency cancels.
Pine Ridge Agency, Dakota Terr on regular 6c banknote, Fort Yates, and Fort Totton
Fort Stanton, Fort Thornton, Fort Wingate
Fort Totton, Fort Cummings, Fort Baker
Fort Fred Steel, Fort Levenworth, and the Otoe Anency, Neb on O17 3c Interior.
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Well, those are fantastic! Never heard of fort cancels, very interesting. Thanks for posting the info along with the oictures.
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Fort Cummings? Really? I'm impressed. I've seen the little that remains of Fort Cummings — a few low, crumbling adobe walls — just east of Cook's Peak, in New Mexico, which I climbed twice in the early 1960s. The U.S. Cavalry was stationed there in the last half of the 1800s, fighting Apaches, who believed correctly that their land was being invaded by miners and settlers moving west. I knew a man in nearby Silver City, where I grew up, who was hiking in the desert near Fort Cummings when he kicked at a stick in the sand. It didn't break, nor move much. He was curious, so he dug it up. It was the barrel of a Colt .45 pistol, with an 1880s date on it, five spent cartridges in the chambers, and one that hadn't been fired.
Here's a Wikipedia map showing the location of Fort Cummings:
I've published a web page about my Cook's Peak climb. See Climbing Cook's Peak. It includes images of the surrounding area as well as aerial photos of the mountain.
Bob
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"Fort Cummings? Really? I'm impressed. I've seen the little that remains of Fort Cummings — a few low, crumbling adobe walls.."
Interesting. A few months before my last computer crash long ago. I had a 3.5" floppy driven Album Pager, and scaned maps in an old Fort of the West book that showed maps of the territories and location of the Forts, but there was just too many miles between the cancels that I have to get more than two forts per page. Never could get the new computer for read that floppy! Still have three boook on Forts.
Also have never found a comprable album page maker.
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Very interesting. Thanks for the link to the article!
Lars
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Thank you, gentlemen. I've been doing web pages for something like 17 or 18 years. Our son, Paul Ingraham, taught me basic HTML, and just last year gifted me and his mom with software he had written that allows us to create web pages using mostly text and a handful of HTML commands. Headlines, subheads, paragraphs, italics, boldface, left-, centre-, and right-justification of images, drop shadows, cutlines, sidebars, blockquotes, and footnotes can each be generated with a minimum of keystrokes.
Examples: Single asterisks around text provide italics. Double asterisks at the beginning and end of text provide boldface. The command !stars creates a separator of...three stars! A simple > turns a paragraph into a block quote. !sidebar followed by text creates a boxed sidebar. An image file name followed by text gives you the image on the web page with a cutline beneath it. Cool, eh? (Our son's a bright guy. I think he was switched with our baby at the hospital! He now makes a good living with his own web site, selling ebooks about pain control; he is a massage therapist.)
It's now possible to create a basic web page, provided you have already written the text, in as little as five minutes. It's been fun.
If you'd like to take a look at more web pages, go to Ephemeral Treasures. As always, if you notice any problems, please let me know. The biggest challenge these days is designing web pages which display correctly on the dozens of different devices that people have in their hands.
Bob
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"I don't really know when an O51 became more sought after than an O51s, although I do have a 1928 Scott and a 1932 Scott, they are both World Catalogues, my earlist Scott Specilized is a 1940 edition, which lists both a mint O51 and a used O51 at $4.00, and an O51s at $20.00 "
I have a 1928 Specialized and the reprint specimens don't have prices. The 1c went for 50c used, 60c mint, 85c specimen, so even then the reprints were more expensive. The rest of the reprints didn't have prices, but a complete set of reprints was listed at $115.00. Of course, if you had $115 in 1928 you could also buy a complete MINT set of Columbus stamps PLUS a complete MINT set of Trans-Mississippi PLUS a mint 5c 2nd Bureau 5c coil and still have 19 cents left over. Today all that lists north of $20,000. O47S-O56S list for under $15,000, so they haven't gained in relative value since 1928.
Lars
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"Today all that lists north of $20,000. O47S-O56S list for under $15,000, so they haven't gained in relative value since 1928."
Yes, sadly the Officials lack the popularity of the regular issues, and the Special Printing of the Officials were dealt a harsh blow when Continental decided to overprint them with the word SPECIMEN, And when they were cataloged, they were placed under the Specimen listings, which hides their true nature as Special Printings. Compare them to the regular issue special printing which were listed with the regular issues and even given a scott number. I say were, because my latest Scott Specialized is a 1982, I have no idea what had been re-numbered on not.
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I only have a Specialized every 15 or 20 years. 1990 is similar to your 1982, but 2008 has the reprints listed in the main section of Officials as a special printing. They properly cataloged them (finally).
Lars
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Interesting discussion. My 2011 Scott list the O47S - O56S at $40,650 with the O49S and O56S with no value. All the stamp values were in italics. The 2011 Scott still has them listed under Special Printings.
Mel
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"All the stamp values were in italics."
Not sure now but values in italics used to mean that the stamp was rarely sold or traded.
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Don, that meaning remains true.
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I think it also can mean that the prices were fluctuating wildly at the time the catalog was printed. Example - many europa issues.
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It also is found on used stamps where the unused or mint value is less than the used, such as the German inflation issues following World War I. It is also found on many used British stamps where the value refers to a cancel that is not CTO, or a cancel showing that the stamp was used during the time that the stamp was in use. Those are just a couple of examples.
If the value is italicized, it means to be careful as to what you pay, and if the value is high, you might consider getting a certificate before purchasing it, such as with the used stamps.
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About a month ago I showed a small collection of the 1875 Special Printing of the departmental stamps that had been altered by unidentified fakers. Because these stamps were in use at the time and were intended for departmemtal use only, it was decided to overprint the stamps with the word SPECIMEN. The regular departmental stamps were difficult to obtain even used, during their period of use 1873-1884.
Most of these "fakes" were made pretty easily, just by drawing a heavy line of ink across the word SPECIMEN. Most "stamp gatherers" as we were called then were not interested in the overprinted stamps but a used stamp was another story. I would guess that this practice of faking used stamps continued until the turn of the century, as when closely examined, some of these mutilated stamps are the wrong color, and or paper. In thier greedy quest, these neferious folks have destroyed or at least altered scarce and sometimes, rare stamps.
For my first example, I'll discuss this "used" O51. I don't really know when an O51 became more sought after than an O51s, although I do have a 1928 Scott and a 1932 Scott, they are both World Catalogues, my earlist Scott Specilized is a 1940 edition, which lists both a mint O51 and a used O51 at $4.00, and an O51s at $20.00
Of the regular stamp, there were 38, 200 issued, the O51s was a mere 177 copies. Looking closely at the stamp, you will notice that there is a line through the left half of the O in POST, it looks like a fiber as the crosshatched background shading is disturbed all the way to the unprinted inner oval. Another fiber crossed the lower label border and is showing on the left of the S of POST. Now, if that is a constant plate variety, there are possibly 382 copies of that variety on the regular stamp, but only 2 of them could exist on O51s.One less rarity!
Some of the "alterations" were convincing, as this "used O10" is at first glance, but wait! Its the wrong color! The only 1 cent Executive that was that color is the third printing American Bank Note Company's O10 xs, and sure enough when examined with the powerfull Wolfe binonular microscope ( 200X - 400X ) faint traces of the overprint are visible through the blue quatered cork, which is another clue, there are no blue cancelattions on Executive stamps. The stamp was only used in two places, Washington,DC and the Presidents summer home in Long Island, NY.
When I first saw this stamp on ebay, I knew immediatly that it was faked, but wanted it for my Fake reference collection. As soon as the stamp arrived I scanned it at 1200 dpi, and then email the seller, telling him what I had found ( what I knew I was going to find ) and attached a copy of my scan to my email, asking for a return of my money, and then explained that I did want to but the stanp but not at the hammered down price. The next day I got an email agreeing to my offer. 4,652 copies of this stamp were sold, and there is an error in the printing, the Broken I. Can't tell if this is one of the 46 or 47 errors.
This last one was harder to spot, It also is the wrong color, but the difference is subtle. It is also the wrong paper, this time from the forth printing, again an American printing Sc O57 xs. Luckly there were no errors in this printing, other than the mismatched type size that is one of the identifing traits of this stamp, but again, that is hidden from us. Only 1,672 copies were sold.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
What a pleasure to read the info presented. Good job!
Best,
Dan C.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
littleriverphil,
Thanks for the informative presentation!!!
Can you tell me if there are any items in my official section that warrant a closer look?
http://www.larsdog.com/stamps/bob.htm
Thanks!
Lars
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Thank you Dan.
"Can you tell me if there are any items in my official section that warrant a closer look?"
Nothing that looks altered, although I'd check O38 for the "Line through the N" variety, can't see the dollar values well enought to tell if they are the German "Facsimilies" and, on O88, is that a wreath fort cancel?
Here is one of the Gereman facsimilies, a convincing fake purple cancel is hiding the printed FACSIMILE on the lined panel between DEPARTMENT OF and STATE that has been partially scraped away. Notice that the lined panel is disturbed and does not show the 5 green lines that it should. I suspect that the crease was deliberate, done to lend some credibilty to it being used. I've also uploaded a scan of my Snef ( German ) facsilime that has an additional FACSIMILE handstamp in purple.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"Nothing that looks altered, although I'd check O38 for the "Line through the N" variety"
I see that listed in my Scott Specialized, but it doesn't change the CV much so I'm not concerned about that one.
"can't see the dollar values well enough to tell if they are the German "Facsimilies""
If, by dollar values, you mean O68-71, I have certs on O68 and O71. O69 and O70 are proofs. I wouldn't buy ANY O68-O71 without a cert!
"on O88, is that a wreath fort cancel?"
This one, one the other hand, really makes a difference in value! I don't know what a fort cancel is. Where can I learn more?
Thanks for the feedback!!!
Lars
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"This one, one the other hand, really makes a difference in value! I don't know what a fort cancel is. Where can I learn more?"
"One of the romantic and historically fascinating aspects of Untider States official stamps is the use of War Department stamps at forts established to protect the Western settlement routes from Indian depredations. Alan C. Campbell "
The above quote from Alan C. Campbell is the opening sentance in his 11 page article on the Killers of Fort Levenworth in Volume: 53 Number: 1 Year: 2001 Chronicle 189, avaible here on The U.S. Philatelic Classics Society "Web Chronicle" page. ( select issuse 189 )
http://www.uspcs.org/resource-center/chronicle-information/web-chronicle/
SON Fort Cancels command high prices and there are major collections of them. Even a partial can bring premiums. Most are CDS duplexed with a killer, some are fancy as the mentioned atricle will tell you more about. In my own collection I have several partial forts and a couple of son Agency cancels.
Pine Ridge Agency, Dakota Terr on regular 6c banknote, Fort Yates, and Fort Totton
Fort Stanton, Fort Thornton, Fort Wingate
Fort Totton, Fort Cummings, Fort Baker
Fort Fred Steel, Fort Levenworth, and the Otoe Anency, Neb on O17 3c Interior.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Well, those are fantastic! Never heard of fort cancels, very interesting. Thanks for posting the info along with the oictures.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Fort Cummings? Really? I'm impressed. I've seen the little that remains of Fort Cummings — a few low, crumbling adobe walls — just east of Cook's Peak, in New Mexico, which I climbed twice in the early 1960s. The U.S. Cavalry was stationed there in the last half of the 1800s, fighting Apaches, who believed correctly that their land was being invaded by miners and settlers moving west. I knew a man in nearby Silver City, where I grew up, who was hiking in the desert near Fort Cummings when he kicked at a stick in the sand. It didn't break, nor move much. He was curious, so he dug it up. It was the barrel of a Colt .45 pistol, with an 1880s date on it, five spent cartridges in the chambers, and one that hadn't been fired.
Here's a Wikipedia map showing the location of Fort Cummings:
I've published a web page about my Cook's Peak climb. See Climbing Cook's Peak. It includes images of the surrounding area as well as aerial photos of the mountain.
Bob
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"Fort Cummings? Really? I'm impressed. I've seen the little that remains of Fort Cummings — a few low, crumbling adobe walls.."
Interesting. A few months before my last computer crash long ago. I had a 3.5" floppy driven Album Pager, and scaned maps in an old Fort of the West book that showed maps of the territories and location of the Forts, but there was just too many miles between the cancels that I have to get more than two forts per page. Never could get the new computer for read that floppy! Still have three boook on Forts.
Also have never found a comprable album page maker.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Very interesting. Thanks for the link to the article!
Lars
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Thank you, gentlemen. I've been doing web pages for something like 17 or 18 years. Our son, Paul Ingraham, taught me basic HTML, and just last year gifted me and his mom with software he had written that allows us to create web pages using mostly text and a handful of HTML commands. Headlines, subheads, paragraphs, italics, boldface, left-, centre-, and right-justification of images, drop shadows, cutlines, sidebars, blockquotes, and footnotes can each be generated with a minimum of keystrokes.
Examples: Single asterisks around text provide italics. Double asterisks at the beginning and end of text provide boldface. The command !stars creates a separator of...three stars! A simple > turns a paragraph into a block quote. !sidebar followed by text creates a boxed sidebar. An image file name followed by text gives you the image on the web page with a cutline beneath it. Cool, eh? (Our son's a bright guy. I think he was switched with our baby at the hospital! He now makes a good living with his own web site, selling ebooks about pain control; he is a massage therapist.)
It's now possible to create a basic web page, provided you have already written the text, in as little as five minutes. It's been fun.
If you'd like to take a look at more web pages, go to Ephemeral Treasures. As always, if you notice any problems, please let me know. The biggest challenge these days is designing web pages which display correctly on the dozens of different devices that people have in their hands.
Bob
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"I don't really know when an O51 became more sought after than an O51s, although I do have a 1928 Scott and a 1932 Scott, they are both World Catalogues, my earlist Scott Specilized is a 1940 edition, which lists both a mint O51 and a used O51 at $4.00, and an O51s at $20.00 "
I have a 1928 Specialized and the reprint specimens don't have prices. The 1c went for 50c used, 60c mint, 85c specimen, so even then the reprints were more expensive. The rest of the reprints didn't have prices, but a complete set of reprints was listed at $115.00. Of course, if you had $115 in 1928 you could also buy a complete MINT set of Columbus stamps PLUS a complete MINT set of Trans-Mississippi PLUS a mint 5c 2nd Bureau 5c coil and still have 19 cents left over. Today all that lists north of $20,000. O47S-O56S list for under $15,000, so they haven't gained in relative value since 1928.
Lars
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"Today all that lists north of $20,000. O47S-O56S list for under $15,000, so they haven't gained in relative value since 1928."
Yes, sadly the Officials lack the popularity of the regular issues, and the Special Printing of the Officials were dealt a harsh blow when Continental decided to overprint them with the word SPECIMEN, And when they were cataloged, they were placed under the Specimen listings, which hides their true nature as Special Printings. Compare them to the regular issue special printing which were listed with the regular issues and even given a scott number. I say were, because my latest Scott Specialized is a 1982, I have no idea what had been re-numbered on not.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
I only have a Specialized every 15 or 20 years. 1990 is similar to your 1982, but 2008 has the reprints listed in the main section of Officials as a special printing. They properly cataloged them (finally).
Lars
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Interesting discussion. My 2011 Scott list the O47S - O56S at $40,650 with the O49S and O56S with no value. All the stamp values were in italics. The 2011 Scott still has them listed under Special Printings.
Mel
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
"All the stamp values were in italics."
Not sure now but values in italics used to mean that the stamp was rarely sold or traded.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
Don, that meaning remains true.
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re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
I think it also can mean that the prices were fluctuating wildly at the time the catalog was printed. Example - many europa issues.
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01:15:21pm
re: Scarce and rare altered stamps
It also is found on used stamps where the unused or mint value is less than the used, such as the German inflation issues following World War I. It is also found on many used British stamps where the value refers to a cancel that is not CTO, or a cancel showing that the stamp was used during the time that the stamp was in use. Those are just a couple of examples.
If the value is italicized, it means to be careful as to what you pay, and if the value is high, you might consider getting a certificate before purchasing it, such as with the used stamps.
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