J92 (4 Cent) Dull Gum Discovered

The dull gum stamps are from pre-gummed rolls of paper from web-fed rotary press dry printing (Huck-Cottrell) which for the U.S. started in the early 1970's. The road to it started in 1914 with the web-fed rotary press wet printing (Stickney) on ungummed paper rolls that were gummed after printing and in the mid 1950's with the web-fed rotary press (less wet but not fully dry) dry printing (Huck-Cottrell) on ungummed paper rolls that were gummed after printing and later in the early 1970's which dry printed on paper rolls that were gummed before printing (pre-gummed).

Thanks for information. The dull gum paper wasn't used on 1959 postage due series until sometime after 1978. The 11 and 13 cents postage dues were issued that year and they are all shiny gum. J104 was issued in 1985 and all of them are dull gum type 1B. My guess is that dull gum paper started to be used on the postage dues some time in the early 1980s.

Plate 35283 was first sent to press on 1974/07/10 and cancelled on 1978/03/30 after 251,889 impressions. Plate 35282 was first sent to press on 1977/09/10 and cancelled on 1987/11/12 after 112,444 impressions. I know the plate for 35283 was broken and retired. So it must have been broken before 1977/09/10. Then it was replaced by 35282. Plates 34283/35283 were paired when printed on the Huck-Cottrell press. After 35283 was retired 34283/35282 were paired. This is when the color of the ink changed since all stamps printed from 35282 have the new ink color and all of this printing has shiny gum. All of the later dull gum postage due printings have the third color ink.



J93 new ink color and all shiny gum



J92 dull gum

The 4 cent dull gum is now listed in the Scott Specialized as of 2021 with only a dash for the values. I still continue to search for new examples, but I haven't any others as of this date. I do believe J-96 (8 cent) dull gums were also produced and I'm still hopeful in finding them too.

And continues as listed in 2022 Specialized Edition.

Just curious as to what members think the 4 cent dull gums ought to be valued at.

An excellent question which I've thinking of about the last 6 years. The current specialized values the J95 (7 cent) plate blocks at $3500. I have 8 of them which back in the day I paid 28 cents each. I suspect their are probably 50 to 100 of those in existence. There are on four only plate blocks of the dull gum J92s. So I don't have any answer either.

Also, last year I found a J95 35307 UL which I reported to Durland's.



I recently found a full sheet of J94 dull gum and it's only the second one I found in 35 years. I also found a part sheet of 91 of them too at nearly the same time.

Update coming soon.

Can I surmise that another example of the 4 cent dull gum has been found?

I only discovered this a while back and reported it to Durland.The denominations were printed using the same method as precanceling and the rubber mattes used were 100 subjects. Up to now there were two different types of the 4 cent matte. On type I the '4' is much closer to 'CENTS' and on type II it's further away. On the dull gum the base of the '4' is much smaller and begins above the end of the 'E' and ends just past the start of the 'T'. Apparently when the 4 cent dull gum was printed a new matte was used which was different than the other two.

The first one is from the the 4 cent dull gum; the second is type I which only occurs on plates 26289, 26290, 26291 and 26292; and the third is type II which occurs on all plate numbers used. As you can see the one from the dull gum is different from the other two.

Really interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing!

One of my favorite posts, but where is the "soon" update?


Peter

No problem. I'm glad to do it. The 1959 postage due issue is very interesting with lots of varieties. Also, I recently found new mattes for the 1 and 7 cent denominations which I've reported to Durland too. They are much like the varieties on the 4 cent where the denomination is close to the 'CENTS'. I'm still working on the 2 cent ones.




Thanks, glad you like it. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

The new info will appear in Linn's.

Interesting..... When I found them back in April 2016 Linn's didn't seem particularly interested in doing a story about the J92 dull gums. The only people that were was the United States Stamp Society in the 'The United States Specialist' (September 2016 - volume 87,number 9) and the 'U.S. Stamp News' (July 2016).

I just learned from a reliable source that a full sheet of the 4 cent dull gum has been discovered. I asked if a picture of the sheet could be provided and I'll post
it here when I receive it.

Since the info has been leaked, it will appear in an upcoming Dutch Country auction.