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Thanks everyone for the help! I have only been collecting a year so I have a lot more questions lol |
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Bedrock Of The Community
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Quote: The letters, especially the "I" wander vertically. This can bee seen with the enlarging feature once you bring up the image from the listing. Full disclosure, I did not bother to do the same with the larger block. The smaller made the point. Have to strongly disagree. The top image is the OP's stamp. Notice that the letters wander vertically, and the letters are poorly formed. The first "E" shows this poor form in particular with the middle leg not centered. The bottom image is a close-up of the Siegel block with selvedge position 1 stamp overprint. There is no comparison. The poor overprint impression still allows you to see that the letters are all well aligned, and the letters are well formed. The two overprints could not be more different, and no one has yet to provide another example of these issues that come close to matching the OP's stamp.   |
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Pillar Of The Community
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[q} see that the letters are all well aligned[/q]
Well in the position one you show, the "I" is a tad short at the bottom likely due to printing, not the underlying letter. However I refereed to other positions for the wandering letters.
I would be nice if someone could post a copy of the informational Scott paragraph mentioned in an earlier post at the beginning of the .Specimen section for Officials.
Edit: I am not saying the overprint is or is not fake, I am just pointing out the fuzzy edges of what may be fake and what maybe genuine. |
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Edited by Parcelpostguy - 11/28/2024 2:05 pm |
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Quote: It would be nice if someone could post a copy of the informational Scott paragraph mentioned in an earlier post at the beginning of the .Specimen section for Officials. Here is the information from my 2017 Scott Specialized  |
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That makes a lot of sense Partime, because the stamp is on soft porous paper and the overprint series starts at O1s which is on Thin hard white paper |
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Lampy288, As mentioned, this group of stamps were not very popular with collectors of the day, but the 1 cent Agriculture, Executive, Justice , and State Departments were very popular with the dealers in the packet trade, by Dec of 1875 the first printing of the above four stamps had sold out, and 10 000 more each were ordered and printed. The O57S that you have shown here is more likely to be a worn ribbed paper than a soft paper stamp, from the second printing O57XS soft paper stamps have a totally different font used for the overprint, a darker red ink and very few of the letters match size. These are from the fourth printing.  |
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Edited by littleriverphil - 11/29/2024 10:32 am |
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Bedrock Of The Community
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Lampy - Not sure what auction house you purchased it from, but the lot listing is strange. The estimate of $800-$1000 is WAY off of catalog. The description of MNH is inapplicable since these were issued without gum. O57S catalogs for $32.50 and O57xS catalogs for $180. The listing mentions soft, porous paper but that is not a O57s but rather a O57xs. |
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I agree with rogdcam, with a $180 CV, the messy perfs and smudged overprint, the most optimistic auction estimate I would give would be $80-$100 and as a buyer $40 would probably be my limit. If it is soft paper, it almost certainly proves the overprint is not fake, because there are no soft paper State officials, right? Nor are they any known double overprints on the O57xS, only on the O57S.
The last listing on the Siegel auction page that Lampy posted earlier was block of an "unusual variety" with "mixed font" (the "E" looks larger and boldface) on the O57xS and still it sold for only 20% of catalog. I don't think the smudgy and misaligned letters add any value to this item but maybe a specialist in the issue would be interested in seeing different stages of lettering anomalies. |
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I agree with the comment of a very poorly written description by the auction house. In fact, they list this as "1c Executive, Navy, State on Soft Porous Paper ...". My Scott describes O57S as State, not Navy, or Post Office, or Justice, etc. I don't know your options right now, but paying anything above catalog value is way too much.
Or, was there another Navy Stamp that I am not seeing? |
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Here is the front and back of a certed (old APS) O57xS. As you can see the size of the letters in the overprint don't match. Not the same 6 point gothic type used for the first two printings. Please note the fibers extending from the perf tips, I don't see that on the OP's supposed O57xS.   |
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rogdcam- I was relatively new to stamp collecting at the time of the auction and others were bidding also, I have paid for my lessons in stamp collecting lol |
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Partime- There was no other stamps in that lot, I just recently noticed the executive part of the listing |
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