Classic US Meters

Here is a recent acquisition.



To me this is the last of the classic US meter designs.

Here is the front-

Say that's really neat! I never ever seen one of those before? When did the mailomat go away?

Also your meter may be on this page-

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Intern...p_and_bottom

Actually, in the Meter Catalog reference posted earlier, the Mailomat Postcard example is a G4(B)(b) with known Meter Nos. from 51003 to 51029. Obviously, the one in the above example is Meter No. 51006.

Meter on a post card - you don't see many of those - and the impression is excellent.

So those numbers are unique to each meter then? That makes things a lot easier!

I can't believe I didn't know that!?

Yes, the meter number on metered postage is the identification number of that particular meter machine (whether it is in a Mailomat or post office or non-profit or business).

Most meter numbers are cataloged by what company or organization used that meter machine.

Thank you smauggie. Man do I feel dumb now...I just don't handle a lot of these. On the bright side of this is that I do have some older meters so now I know how to ID them. When life gives you lemons...

That's a neat card. I don't ever recall seeing a meter on a postcard though.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe there is some listing of the really old postage meter machines (circa 1930s) and what companies used them. Not so for the more modern ones, though, due to the proliferation of postage meters and privacy concerns over publishing information about the leasees of the postage meter equipment. Obviously the postage meter manufacturers have this information, as does the US Postal Service, but to the best of my knowledge it is not readily attainable information to the collecting public. That's exactly why it is so important for collectors to keep the meter cover intact in order to properly identify the meter number to the company involved.

Agreed. Right now I am using a spreadsheet to catalog my meters. Where I can identify the company, I include that information. I would say so far, about 90% of my cataloged meters have a company or organization identified as the user.

I guess this is classic since it is dated 1940, though obviously the IA3 was used through the 1970's.





Another Mailomat cover with a great slogan.

Nice clean cover Smauggie, first I've seen like that, very nice !

I really like the information on the back of the card. I have a cover I was meaning to show you. It is the first airmail meter. I See here that the Mail-O-Mat at the time of this card had rates up to 32 cents and it had airmail available. I am wondering when they started that? I can scan the cover tonight when I get home. I am at work now, goofin' off, again.

I missed this the first time around, apparently. I also have one of those Mailomat cards: https://goscf.com/t/32106 (2nd post)

smauggie, I love your Mailomat cover, too!

Smauggie,
I know you love metered covers. Here is the first Airmail meter. The company is Laboratory Products, Co. They made baby food.After they got permission to add the airmail mark on their meter, they were flooded with requests from collectors requesting covers, so they actually charged collectors 10 cents for each cover to help with their costs of additional handling. I have a newspaper article from 1929 about this. I have no idea how common these are, or if they have an increased value. My meter catalog from 1959 lists this as scarce, but I have found a lot of items that were listed as scarce back then are actually fairly common. If you have any more information, I would love to hear it.

Nice one! I had never seen one like that before.