Sometimes What Looks Like A Deal Is Not!

Safest way is to purchase them in pair as a minimum, if they were avail in perforated and non perforated format, or only buy with a ceretificate from a reputable foundation such as the VVGreene

VVGreene?

That particular firm is not very market-acceptable here in the U.S., at least for U.S. material.

Since we're talking about early U.S. revenues, under the assumption that we're talking U.S. market, I would pretty much only recommend the Philatelic Foundation. PSE, PSAG, and APS are a tier down, in my opinion, and for those certs I'd want to know WHO the specific expertizers were for a particular item.

At one time the APS indicated who the expertizers were on each cert... something I wish ALL expertizers would do. Even if the expertizers aren't listed on an APS cert, the APS will provide that information upon request. I do not know if PSE or PSAG will do that.

The reason it is important is that not all expertizers are revenue experts, so you need to know who specifically examined the item. I've heard some horror stories (from those who would know) about some incorrect opinions that have been rendered.

That's why, in some cases, old APS certs are more acceptable to me than an older PF or PSE cert. If I look at a cert from the 1980s or 1990s and see that Richard Friedberg, Robert Cunliffe, and Eric Jackson were the expertizers, I'm pretty comfortable with the rendered opinion. If I see a name or names I don't recognize, then I start to question why the stamp doesn't have a more recent cert.

I don't include Weiss certs in the mix, because while I like Bill, and his certs are gaining more acceptability at auction, I don't consider U.S. revenues to be one of his strong areas.

In other countries different rules apply, and I'm not up on all of the non-U.S. expertizers. However, given some of the descriptions I've seen of U.S. material in some of the major international auctions, I wouldn't trust expertization of a company I'm unfamiliar with. They may be qualified to judge eearly U.S. revenues... but then again they may not.

Hey guys,

Thank you both for taking the time to look at my stamps!
I did some examining of my own, here's what I found.
The R64 is about 22-23 mm wide at the bottom, the area at top right does not have any regular pattern that would indicate perfs, also the area of the margin next to the "60" that's just below sticks out further.
So I'm thinking if the upper area was indeed perfs there would be more clear evidence below, but no sign of any regular pattern.

As for the R42, yes that wavy/jaggedness is from the scan, the cuts are clean. The bottom also measures 22-23mm.

After looking at these details I think I'm more confident that these are legit, I guess I'm the tiebreaker
Of course one day I'll find some nicer examples of both.

Again thank you both for giving your expertise!

I would also tell you to look at the paper. I hesitated with this due to it's quasi subjective nature. In that most collectors have no clue as to how to tell the difference. 1st Issue Imperf's and Part Perf's are on "Thin Hard Paper" the best description I can think of is to look at it from the back. if you can fairly easily see the printing it is probably the "Thin Hard Paper" (a good thing). The impression should be clean and sharp as well! Remember these are from the early printings. With the additional information that my questions are scanner annomalies. I would say that they are most likely agree that they are legitimate.