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Stamp rarities usually have great stories behind them. Here are a few that are expected to make an appearance at Washington 2006.

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Sweden’s 3-skilling Color Error

Click to enlarge

Last auctioned November 8, 1996 for $2,270,000 (inc. buyer’s premium) by Feldman

The stamp, the world’s most valuable, will also be on display at Washington 2006. Like the only stamp of greater fame, the British Guiana 1c magenta of 1856, there is but a single known copy of the Sweden 3 skilling error of color of 1855. Like the British Guiana, it, too was discovered by a schoolboy, who, in response to a Stockholm dealer’s public offer in 1885 of 7 kroner for the 3 skilling stamps, found it while searching through his late grandfather’s correspondence. His grandmother let him soak the stamp off the envelope and he duly collected his 7 kroner without realizing that the stamp he had found was an error. Not so the dealer: he knew that the 3 skilling stamp had been printed in green, not in the orange-yellow of the stamp he had bought from the boy. He knew he had a valuable find, probably one-of-a-kind, for which he turned down an offer of 300 kroner. He sold it eventually to a dealer in Vienna, Austria, who sold it in 1894 to the 19th century’s most renowned collector, Baron Philipp la Rénotière von Ferrary, for 4,000 gold florins.

After World War I, the stamp changed hands several times, eventually ending up in the possession of King Carol II of Romania, who paid approximately $30,000 for it in 1937.

It was at the 1974 STOCKHOLMIA stamp exposition that the controversy about the 3 skilling error arose. The Swedish Postal Museum turned down the opportunity to purchase it on suspicion that it was a forgery and set up a commission to prove its suspicion correct. Others formed another commission to prove its authenticity. The evidence provided by the two commissions led to the conclusion that a stray 3 skilling cliché had found its way into a printing of the orange-yellow 8 skilling stamps--and thus that the Stockholm dealer and Ferrary had been right about their error. Monied collectors seem to agree: the 3 skilling-banco orange-yellow was sold at auction in 1978 and again in 1984, when it went for about $455,000, the second highest price ever paid for a single stamp.

It auctioned most recently on November 8, 1996 in a David Feldman auction for $2,270,000 (2,875,000 Swiss francs), making it the most valuable stamp in the world, at least until another tops that price. That’s a whopping $39 billion dollars a pound! It is insured for $15,000,000.

This stamp has its own web site at http://www.treskillingyellow.com, where further details can be seen.

There is also a very detailed recent article written by Australian dealer Glen Stephens about this stamp's fascinating history at http://www.glenstephens.com/snmay05.html.

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The Inverted Jenny: Most Famous of U.S. Stamp Gems

Plate block last sold October 12, 1989 for $1,100,000 (inc. buyer’s premium) by Christies, New York

What collector hasn’t dreamed of the thrill of leaving a post office counter knowing that he has discovered on the stamps he has just bought an error that had passed undetected through the security processes of the Postal Service? Such was the good fortune that befell Washingtonian William T. Robey on May 14, 1918 when he walked away with a full sheet of the most famous U.S. postal error, the 24c airmail invert, popularly known as “the inverted Jenny.”

Three bi-colored stamps featuring a Curtis Jenny biplane--of which the 24c was the highest value--had been issued for use on mail flown on the first scheduled airmail service in the U.S. Being a collector, Robey carefully examined the stamps he was shown by the postal clerk and noted that they were slightly off-center. The clerk suggested he return later in the day, when a new supply would be available.

It was on his second visit that he was astonished to find a full pane of 100 stamps with inverted vignettes of the Jenny. He bought the pane and then searched at other post offices for another, but found no more.

News of Robey’s good fortune spread rapidly and the Post Office Department halted sales of the 24c airmail to conduct its own search, but it, too, found no more. Robey sensibly refused to be persuaded by a postal inspector to resell his pane to the government and kept his find.

He sold the pane intact for $15,000 to Eugene Klein of Philadelphia, who numbered each stamp by position before selling it to Colonel Edward H.R. Green for $20,000. Green saw no reason to keep the pane intact and broke it up, keeping for himself a block of eight containing the plate number, three special blocks of four and 18 singles, 13 of which were straight-edge copies; a total of 48 stamps. The block of eight was later sold and divided and one of the blocks of four subsequently broken up by Raymond H. Weill, the legendary New Orleans dealer.

The saga of these stamps continues. In 1955, one of the blocks-of-four was stolen at the American Philatelic Society (APS) convention. Before her death, the lady to whom it belonged willed her interest in the stolen stamps to the American Philatelic Research Library, should they ever be found. In 1977 one stamp from the block (remember, Mr. Klein had numbered each stamp) was found. It sold in 1981 for $115,000 and the proceeds went to the library. A second stamp has since been recovered and the search for the remaining two continues.

In 1979, early in the brief investment mania in stamps, a businessman paid $500,000 for the famous “Princeton” block of four. By the time it was auctioned again, in December 1982, the boom in stamp investing had gone bust and his block realized only $175,000.

Three position blocks of four of the inverted Jennies were auctioned off for sale by Christie’s New York on October 12, 1989. The plate block sold for $1,100,000; the center line block for $550,000; and the guideline block for $528,000. All prices include the buyer’s premium.

Thus does the odyssey of these 100 stamps with their quaint little aircraft flying upside down continue to excite the public’s interest and spur the collector’s hope of one day being the fortunate finder of a postal error.

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The Dawson Cover

Last sold November 7, 1995 for $2,090,000 (inc. buyer’s premium) by Robert A. Siegel Auction Galleries

This envelope is one of the world’s greatest postal history rarities. It is the only known cover bearing a copy of the 2 cent Hawaiian Missionary issue. Also on the cover are a 5 cent Missionary and a pair of the 3 cent stamps from the Unites States 1851 issue.

The Missionary stamps were so named because they were seen on letters sent by missionaries in Hawaii. The stamps were printed at a newspaper plant in Hawaii. This particular cover was salvaged nearly a century ago from an industrial firm in New England.

A worker cleaning out some partly burned papers in the company's furnace found the now famous cover in the ashes and debris. The envelope bears a scorch mark on the left side, below the pair of 3 cent stamps. It was sent to New York City from Honolulu, where it was posted on October 4, 1852.

The 5 cent Missionary paid the rate from Hawaii to San Francisco and the 2 cents paid the ship captain's fee. The pair of 3 cent 1851s paid the postage from California to New York.

The Dawson cover was reproduced on a 2002 souvenir sheet by the United States Postal Service. It once belonged to the Canadian-born industrialist George H. Worthington, who later settled in Cleveland, Ohio after amassing a fortune from a variety of businesses including railroad construction, quarrying, and chewing gum manufacture. He accumulated one of the most valuable philatelic collections in the United States in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which included a Post Office Mauritius cover and the 5 cent Alexandria “Blue Boy” postmaster provisional.

The Hawaiian Missionary stamps are rare, especially on cover. This particular cover was sold in recent years for over $2 million.

It is currently in a private collection and will be shown at Washington 2006.

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The US 1847 Proof Panes

Last sold in 1997

The first postage stamps of the United States were released in 1847. Prepaying for a letter to travel to its recipient was a rather new concept, as 98% of letters of the time were typically mailed "postage due." These stamps were produced in response to the Congressional Act of March 3, 1947 (9 Stat. 200) which authorized the Postmaster General to produce stamps for the prepayment of postage.

The 5 cent value depicted Benjamin Franklin, the first U.S. Postmaster General, and prepaid letters weighing a half-ounce or less mailed to destinations up to 300 miles away. George Washington's likeness was placed on the 10 cent value for letters primarily with destinations beyond 300 miles. There were 29 states in the country then, along with a handful of territories.

The New York printing firm of Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson designed and produced the stamps. It is interesting to note that a likeness of General Jackson was originally used on an essay for the 5 cent value, but later replaced by Franklin at the request of Postmaster General Nathan K. Hall. The company was paid at a rate of 25 cents per 1,000 stamps. Over 3.7 million 5 cent stamps and 891,000 10 cent stamps were eventually delivered to post offices over nearly four years.

The panes above are believed to be Rawdon, Wright, Hatch & Edson salesmen samples to show potential customers the quality of their work. They were found in the corporate archives of the American Banknote Company in 1997, which absorbed the Rawdon firm in 1858. Each stamp of the proof panes is marked with the word "SPECIMEN."

At the time of the auction, cut-to-size die proofs were pasted down over the full plate proofs. There was some concern that they couldn't be removed without significant damage to the underlying pages. However the task was accomplished successfully to reveal the unique proof panes.

See more details on the National Postal Museum web site.

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The "Blue Boy"

Story pending.

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