First (Only?) Stamp Company Stock Certificate

In December 2012, Robert Siegel held a multi-day auction containing, among other things, the collection and exhibit material of the late Steven Belasco. Hidden within that material was a lot containing 10 examples of one of the coolest philatelic items I've ever seen: presumably the first stock certificates ever issued for a U.S. stamp company, issued in 1866.

I bid aggressively on the lot, but ultimately came up the underbidder. I was able to find out who outbid me and contacted them to find out if they were planning to part them out. They were, so I bought one. It cost me considerably more than the pro-rata cost would have been had I won the lot, but since I had no way of knowing what the other party's top bid would have been, and this kept me from having to put out 4+ figures, this is fine by me. There were also 6 more examples in the collection balance lot, but that went for 5 figures... not an option.

This is not only an attractive piece to revenue collectors, with a wonderful multiline printed cancel, but to stamp collectors/historians in general.

From the Belasco exhibit:

Edgar H. Judkins, a Lowell Mass. stamp dealer, began using the name United States Stamp Company in 1865. E.T. Gage was a clerk in Lowell. In 1866 they sold shares in the United States Stamp Company in what may have been the first syndication of a stamp business. At least 100 shares were sold to several different investors. The 5-cent revenue rate applied to shares in an unincorporated company.

The example I received is the one shown in his exhibit and in the Siegel auction catalog. All of the certificates in the lot have the same stamp, cancel, and date. Quite a few of the others in the lot have already been sold, but there are a few still remaining. If anyone's interested in one, please contact me off-board, and I'll put you in contact with the seller. They're not cheap, but how often are you going to come across a such a great historical piece?

Are there any stock certificates from other stamp companies? I've never seen any.

What great looking piece RC - the first "stamp" stock certificate I have seen - would be interesting to know what the history of the compnay turned out to be like

Nice item. Here is a link to the Belasco exhibit
http://siegelauctions.com/exhibits/Belasco.pdf

Not as old as your example, but here's a link to a previous post about a now-defunct philatelic organization that once issued stock, the Philatelic Sons of America:

https://goscf.com/t/22661

Great old piece. At first glance I thought it pre-dated the NYSE. Not even close. According to their website the NYSE was founded in 1817 and before that it was the Buttonwood Agreement. We have been trading stock in this country almost from day one. And to think there was no such thing as electronic broker held shares for most of that time. It must have all been on paper somewhere. Oh to have that old paper. I suppose the shares of the companies that did not make it had numerous uses. Starting fires, wallpaper and various others. Few people probably thought by just sticking them in a chest that someday some would have such high value as just a piece of paper. Probably more value than they had representing ownership of the companies that issued them.

According to this excerpt from a book entitled "Paper Chase: The Amenities of Stamp Collecting" it seems that the United States Stamp Company of Lowell, Mass., was credited with releasing one of the first (if not the first) price list in 1865:

What an amazing document! I missed this thread first time around.

As did I. I really enjoyed reading about this!

Brian