Message Board

Chicago 1873 Expo

Ken:   #2802 (posted Feb.11,2008) in PhilaMercury covers shows the earliest illustrated and postally used US Government postal of the 1873 Chicago Expo. As far as I know this is the only one to this point recorded.  The Expo starting date and the advertiser precede the illustration of the listed one in the postal stationary society catalog.
    by Bruce Nelson            

SPAM from deceased account emails

I also received an email from Harvey's AOL email account, dated this past Tuesday, but which I found only this morning in my Junk email inbox and deleted without inspection.

As I never had occasion to meet with or correspond by email with Mr. Mirsky, I have no ideal how my email address would have been in his address book.

However, my email address is no secret, and has been included within several publications in the past year, LaPosta, The Chronical/Chatter, etc., so it would not be difficult to find and add it to some scamming message.

WARNING:  Stay away from that Nigerian Finance Minister.  He is mine, ALL MINE, and I am working with him on augmenting my retirement account and lifestyle  !!!!

Halifax Cunard Steamers 1851

I have uploaded a two page British document listing the Cunard Line mail steamers serving Halifax in 1851 that has been provided by David Handelman.

Board assistance

Dr Horvath - Welcome! I am sorry that I did not acknowledge your question earlier. 

Most postal history collectors who visit this board will try to respond to questions relating to postal history when the question falls within their area of expertise. Or, refer the question to a more appropriate forum. It is unusal to see questions here about stamps, particularly of such relatively modern vintage. In recent years many collectible dealers have increasingly turned to fancy packaging and promotions to mass market material that might otherwise be difficult to sell.

As Ken intimated, what you have is packaged as a "collectible" and most collectors dread responding to this type of question which is often driven by value-only type questions. 

I would suggest you offer the package back to the coin dealer you evidently purchased it from. Failing that, offer on ebay. If the estate includes a significant amount of this type of investor-packaged stamps, I suggest you contact a brick and mortar auction house.

Dr. Horvath

By asking about the World War II propaganda forgeries, you made it difficult to offer assistance. If that is typical of the collection, the owner probably assembled an overpriced group of curiosities, but not what most of us would recognize as our hobby. On the other hand, if that is merely an adjunct to a real collection, you would do best by contacting the American Philatelic Society's estate advisory service for referral to a stamp dealer of proven integrity in your vicinity.

The Virtual Stamp Club also has an on-line essay advising people who inherit stamp collections on the choices they face.

help

If you ask a question, it will likely be answered.

Help Understanding the message board

Is this site and message board a place where you help novices?

From the other world

e-mail from the beyond is getting a bit common

however i have had two packages returned by the PO with a
handstamp "DECEASED"

the person insist this is not the case

the first time i was truly shook up

Leonard

1873 Expo continued

The smaller item is the back side of the ticket pictured below, which is an electrotype print. The larger print may be a proof of the wood engraving. The building's architect is better known for having designed the penitentiary at Joliet. Today, the Art Institute of Chicago occupies the land on Michigan Avenue where this building stood.

The story of the expo is told in my article on the Farwell Brothers of Chicago, which Richard posted somewhere on this website a couple of years ago.

Inter-State Industrial Exposition of Chicago, 1873

My small collection of this expo's memorabilia is now for sale. There are no covers, and no EX1 postal card, but this would enhance any collection that includes those.
This fair had no postal marking, so the CDS on this ticket is the nearest collectible.

Bogus emails - and the some...

Gail and I were at dinner at Carol Mirsky's house on Tuesday night.  When I got home, there were two spam emails from Harvey's AOL account. 

Dead Men Writing

or... the person could have signed up for http://www.deadmansswitch.net/
This website allows you to compose emails that will be sent out at specified dates subsequent to your death.

Bogus Email

Ditto here on the email purportedly from Harvey. I've received two. They want you to click on the enclosed URL. Do not do that! Could be malware, but also "pshing" for your personal information.

Same here.  Harvey's aol address book has been hacked.  
Don't click on any of the contained links or open any attachments.

I've heard of trying to communicate with the dead, but this is ridiculous.
No disrespect intended.

Spam deceased account emails

Nick K.

If you opened that email you have probably imported onto you computor a virus. This is actually quite an old ploy that I have seen over the years where criminals and hackers take over either existing or terminated domain names. I would run a virus check.

I recieved the same messages from Harvey's email account ... I think any message from that account should be deleted without opening. 

Spooky emails

Yesterday I received two emails purporting to be from Harvey Mirsky. I opened the messages and it was spam. In January a young family member died and I subsequently received two emails purporting to be from the deceased person. This is very unsettling. I wonder if any other Board participants have similar experiences? What an earth could be the aim of the senders?

buying covers in France

I wish to relate my experience in buying covers in France. Last October my wife and I visited the town of Chartres in France to tour the medieval Cathedral there. I found an antique shop in town, and using my very limited fractured French was able to examine a late 19th century family correspondence, and acquired a few common but intriguing covers such as the one I just posted here to the census site. For 1-1/2 euros apiece it was much fun, and the friendly proprietor of the shop really appreciated my humble attempts to speak his language. I could not resist obtaining a cover addressed to the town of Bu, and consequently expanded my horizons.

Favorite French stuff

A bit late posting here (just returned from a trip) but noticed that there were postings of favorite French covers. Thought I would share some of my favorites which I just posted to the census site: Louisiana Independent State use to Bordeaux here, Hale use to Paris here, and finally an East River Post Office to-the-mails use to Paris here.

7R1L

Here are the contents, a weekly bank statement.

7R1L cover

I am going to sell this 1857 cover.  Pricing advice would be appreciated.  The stamp is position 7R1L, a desirable position.  Stamp is 100% sound and the document itself is in an unusually fresh condition.

package delivery

The package being left on the front steps seems to be standard practice around here (upstate SC) - we recently returned from vacation and there was a FedEx envelope plastered to the front steps soaking wet - and it wasn't even for us but the previous residents....called FedEx to ask what to do and they said throw it out....

auction houses

After reading these messages I would still rather deal with Bonhams than the Canadian house that held my lot for 45 days AFTER receiving my check because they wanted to be sure my check had cleared -- the check was only $500 or so

Bonham auction, part 3

Whoopie, received the lot today.  I was not home and my wife went downstairs to get something out of storage, apparently at the time it arrived.  She had no idea it was there until out of simple curiosity she went out on the porch and found the package sitting on a decorative item.  In short, it was left without being signed for!  Whether this was an error on the part of the FedEx driver or Bonham's shipping instructions, I don't know.  I agree with Jim Baird, however: Never again!  What an outfit! 

1847 prices current

Thanks,

Yamil

I just searched Siegel for Scott 2 Charleston covers. They all have that CDS, and none are marked Paid.

Charleston prices current

The cover would be marked PAID if pre-paid and sent stampless.

Here's a list of Charleston from the PF data base.  The cover offered by Ken is the at the bottom of the page.

1847 prices current

Shouldn't this cover show a PAID marking somewhere? The Charleston 10 cds was typically applied to unpaid correspondence from or via Charleston.

Yamil

auction lots delay

A few minutes ago, I received a phone call (at my office) from a well-known UK auction house asking me whether I still wanted lots I had bid on, won, and paid for—in 2007! In a lovely British accent, the caller explained that for some reason (not specified), the lots had not been sent out. I had no memory of even bidding at that auction.

Bonhams

I had my lots the week after the sale and was given a discount on the "proforma" if I paid within 28 days.

More Bonhams Misery

My experience duplicated that reported by Drew - including the call from Keith Harmer. I had given them a CC #. They collected using it the day after the auction - so they can do some things efficiently. Never again.

re: NYC examiner marks research project update

Morning all,

Am nearing completion of adding all reported examples to the data base and have outlined an analysis of what is seen so far in this information.  Hopefully, unless reality calls me away again form this project, a first draft of this information will be available for review on this site sometime in June.

Many thanks to the board members who have already shared images (front and back) of items.  A study like this cannot be accomplished without the help of many.

Let me close with one last call for examples to add to this study.  Currently I am especially interested in the transition periods before (1875-1884) and after (1901-1904) the use of the examiner marks. 

The PL&R of 1879 changed some aspects of how registered mail was processed.   The next major change came with the PL&R of 1902.  Further analysis of these earlier and later items should help me confirm "the rest of this story".

Best regards,

Russ Ryle

PS:  Images of any registered forms processed at NYC form 1875 to 1905 you might have would also be deeply appreciated regardless of how they are marked.

Auctions

My experience with Rumsey's auctions has been equal to that of Siegel's....both outstanding.  Does it really matter if you get your lots three days after the sale or four?  I mean, some of these things we've been waiting many years for anyway! 

1944 US Propaganda forgery Hitler

I have inherited a number of stamps from my dad. I believe he spent serious money on his stamps and I need help verifying values & locations of reputable people who value stamps. My 1st piece I would like to ask anyone who can help me is the: "1944 US Propaganda forgery Hitler Collection of 3 stamps" from Nicholas Bruyer Philatelic Authority. Can anyone help me walk through the initial process of ID what I have and what I should do if our family wants to liquidate these stamps?

I have bought art and some natural history stuff from Bonhams and getting the material was a nightmare to say the least.  Including driving to San Francisco twice.  So I do not do business with them anymore. 

As far as philatelic auctions go they are all fair to awesome .... Siegel being as good as it could get.  Rumsey though is as good as it needs to be ie not really a big difference.  Others not so good.

Bonhams continued

Yup, Dave, could have done that.  Now, let's see: $27 for the train ride, a nice refreshing(?) walk in the Big Apple, and around 4 hours of my time (worth how much, let's say I'm cheap thus only $20/hr.=$80, total a mere $107 extra.  Cheap, I guess, at twice the price????  But you're correct, I would have my lot. 

A direct contrast to Siegel's sale of Harvey Mirsky's collection, where I had in my hands 3000 miles away the winning lots 3 days after the sale concluded.

Maybe you should have taken the train down to the city, walked into their offices, and said "I have my checkbook with me, where's my lots?"

Bonhams recent auction

Ok, folks, I know I bitched about an auction house on the board before but this has got to be the icing on the cake and I can't resist doing it again.

Just got a FedEx Shipment Notification that the lot on won in the April 23rd auction is scheduled to be shipped today.  Hooray!  Considering that the auction closed 22 days ago and I received a bill (no, Proforma) virtually immediately after the close of the sale one wonders what the heck is going on there.  Linn's remarked in the last issue that they were "new" to postal history auctions--and they certainly are.  But they should have good guidance with the presence of Keith Harmer, one would think.

But here's the rest of the story:  Got the "Proforma" and noted that there was NO shipping charges included.  I contacted the person who's name appeared on the document and she indicated that they hadn't organized shipping as yet and someone would contact me.  I waited...and I waited...until I finally called again and was told that they hadn't made arrangements with FedEx as yet and didn't know what the charges would be.  Ten days had gone by--and I hadn't sent in payment since I was waiting to receive notification of how much to add to the bottom line.  Then I received a call from Keith Harmer asking if I was planning to ask for an extension.  I said no but then asked him about shpping charges; he brushed me off saying they were still working on them.   The middle of the next week (now 15 days!) I finally received the notification of the FedEx cost and immediately mailed check for the full amount including shipping/insurance charges.  Next I received an email that there would be delays in shipping out lots since there were so many.  Finally, today's email after 22 days!  One hopes that FedEx can get a package from NYC to Dutchess County, 65 miles away, one one day; that would make it 23 days from purchase to receiving the lot.

I've bid hundreds of times in auctions put on by houses large and small worldwide--but NEVER have I faced such a fouled-up mess.  Did anyone else face a similar situation with the Bonhams sale?  Anyone with a suggestion why this occurred because I would love to hear it.

Prices Current

Gordon,

It's too big for my scanner bed, but here is the first page of the Prices Current. Second page is on the overleaf, and the adjacent blank sheet has a full page business letter to Abraham Bell.

Ken can you post the inside of the cover for sale?

1847 Prices Current

I am the owner's agent for this cover, offered for sale on PM.

Kelleher

I just went on it and it appears to be working fine.

Kellehers

Kellehers website is non-responsive. Has anyone else had a problem?
Cheers, Bob

APS Youth Fellowship Applications Deadline Approaching - May 31st

Hello Philamercury Board Members,

The APS Young Philatelic Leaders Fellowship (YPLF) is still seeking applications for the 2012-13 Fellowship Year. The YPLF seeks to engage the most dedicated young philatelists and expose them to the broader philatelic community. The YPLF removes a critical barrier for enthusiastic young collectors by coordinating transportation, lodging and activities at the APS StampShows, at the Smithsonian National Postal Museum and at the APS Headquaters in Bellefonte, PA. Additionally, the YPLF connects each participating Fellow with seasoned collectors, exhibitors, writers and dealers to expand their perspective and exposure in the philatelic world. Each participant chooses a specific track for his or her yearlong Fellowship: these include Dealer, Writer and Exhibitor tracks.

Please visit - www.stampfellowship.org - for more information on the YPLF

Do you know an enthusiastic young philatelist between the age of 13-25? If so, please contact me at bretalex1@aol.com

Deadline for applications for this upcoming year's class is May 31, 2012.

Thanks!

1855 One Shilling Embossed Block of Six (6x rate) to USA

A note in case anyone on the board bought the 1855 One Shilling Embossed Block of Six (6x rate) to the USA that just sold on a well known auction site (and whose feedback rating is 4,000 or so). The cover has a Liverpool Floating Receiving House CDS on the reverse which indicates the payment of a One Shilling Late Fee in addition to the postage. So, while the manuscript rate/credit markings of '144' and '30' add up fine for 6x, there is a high probability that there should be a seventh stamp on there. The seller is extremely reputable and very honest, but mistakes do happen.

And some who are...

Richard:  nice articles.  Good fundamental background that would be useful for anyone who is not already a student of private expresses...

Why 25 cents?

The cover shown here went from Hanover to Canterbury NH, a distance of just over 60 miles. So, why was the postage 25 cents? The letter is a single sheet, less than one ounce. So shouldn't that postage have been 10 cents?

California Express Mails, 1849-1856

And finally, a nine page article here.

A webpage of links here - additional materials will be added soon.

California Local Posts, 1849-1856

A one page introductory article here.