Precancel Postage Due & Identify Partial Precancel

Being new to this website, I noted the many subject areas that are listed so I decided to start rummaging through my boxes of stamps to see what I have accumulated over the past 5 years and possibly contribute to the discussions. I found about 150+ US precancels and now need your help on two issues. Firstly, the postage due is precanceled. Why would the post office want to precancel this type of stamp. Secondly, the 25 cent Niagara Falls stamp looks like a precancel but first part of it is not legible. I can clearly see the word CITY but the first word is missing. Could this be a KANSAS CITY precancel. Lastly, in my collection I found this card of Honolulu precancels which I thought that I would share with you. Regards Mike

I'm surprised no one has yet responded to your post, so let me try to answer a few of your questions:

(1) As for precanceled postage due stamps, they are very common in the US. The quote below explains it briefly:




The practice of precanceling postage due stamps was discontinued in the 1930's.

(2) The second stamp is definitely a Kansas City, MO precancel that probably met with some debris or inking problem that resulted in the example shown.

(3) The Honolulu set is a very nice start toward a small precancel collection.

As is typical for most precancels, there is little value to most of the common ones, but the challenge of uncovering certain cities and precancel types is an entertaining hobby in itself.

If you are interested in precancels as a side-hobby to your collection, I would suggest you explore this site for further information:

http://www.precancels.com/

Hope you find this information helpful.

wt1, thanks for the informative response. I would like to accumulate some more of these as well as more Canadian precancels. I think for the limited number of US precancels I have, I'll put them in black plastic Vario pages sorted by cities within states. Regards Mike

The Kansas City MO you show is a double print, which is not uncommon for those types. They must have had the sloppiest printers in America in that postoffice. Here is a scan from my KC MO postage dues. I still need a lot of these varieties.