Please Have A Look At This Small Precancel Collection.

According to your description, the latter. These look like your everyday common bureaus and non-bureaus - personally I see nothing of value. Even the dateds are very common. If and when you decide to expand, I highly suggest purchasing the catalogs from the PSC site - they are well worth the price!

While I agree the precancels scanned above are relatively common, don't let that deter you from collecting them. Precancels can be a very interesting sideline to stamp collecting. The thousands of cities and types of precancels available can lead to all kinds of collecting specialities (i.e. certain states, towns, stamp issues, precancel types, etc.) that can make new finds always a bit interesting. Further, since most are of low value, they are very easy to come upon at reasonable prices, so a collection can be made with little financial investment.

Back to your collection, in the first scan (bottom row, second in from left) is a perfin precancel from Rochester, NY. The perfin "EKC" referes to Eastman Kodak Company. Also, some of the dated precancels can be a collection in themselves and the two most popular companies that have the printed dated are MW (Montgomery Ward) and SRC (Sears Roebuck & Co.).

For further information and reading, I would suggest this web site:

http://www.precancels.com/

I find a few interesting items from the 3rd scan position 1, Scott type A167 which would seem to be unusual since the Presidential issues were already out for 4 years it should not have been needed.

The 1st stamp of the next line looks like a L-13 IHS but spacing is off, lines seem narrower.

Also there is a blue overprint, "Nov 43" is rarer valved at .75.

My eye was drawn to 3 stamps at the bottom row of the second scan. The red one is Boston L21 which has a PSS value of 3.00. Also the 2 items on piece look like Boston L19 [the year appears (19)48 but is really a smudgy 43]. These catalog 1.00 each. Sometimes the offbeat varieties of big city precancels are hard to find. The only Boston I need in my collection is the L27 which only catalogs 5.00. If you collect, it pays to look at everything.