Possible # 500 ?? It Has My Attention !

It is a perf 11. It has a strong toga outline.
I see no glue, and minimal red ink on the rear
of the stamp. With what I have learned from our
past threads, I still can not tell if the;
"Minute portion of the second line in both ribbons is present".
I look forward to any thought's.

100% #500

That shows better than "minute".

Thank you chasa and stampcrow.

I was concerned with the minimal ink
left on it's rear from the flat plate press printing.
Could it be from the top of the pile with
little pressure on top? Or from the bottom
of the pile with little ink under it? Also,
others I have seen, have gum on them. Should this
stamp have gum to be MNH?

headed down that slippery slope with you rlm

I posted 3 stamps--- 2 of them I think are 500, one is 499

all perf 11.

or they are offset printings?

500+499+ offset at bottom

impressive chasa,

I did foil test-- upper two stamps passed, thus I believe 500 and 499.

lower stamp I could get nothing on foil except periphery of stamp, so failed. must be 528b offset.

I'm impressed you picked that up from analyzing scan. very nice.

Still waiting for someone else to burst my bubble and tell me they are something else

agree with chasa.....

Since the letters MNH mean "mint never hinged" they imply the presence of gum.

It is not uncommon to find stamps without gum hyped as "mint" when in truth that term implies the presence of gum. Technically it should refer to the condition of a stamp as regularly sold at the post office, which would mean full original gum without hinge marks or other disturbance.

mnh, mlh, mhh, mhr, all these are terms for unused stamps with original gum (og) and varying degrees of hinging. The reference to "hinging" should not be taken too literally, since it is not uncommon to use these grades to refer to gum disturbances due to other causes.
never hinged
lightly hinged
heavily hinged
hinge remnant


To be without gum reduces a stamp to "unused" but not "mint".
I also include stamps with partial or disturbed original gum as unused (not mint). But some sellers hype their stamps as mdg = "mint disturbed gum," by which they mean to say that whatever gum is present is original. A more appropriate term would be "disturbed og." In recent years I have seen increasing use of the term ngai = "no gum as issued" in reference to stamps and proofs that should not have gum to be in their original state.

The one term that is a complete oxymoron is "mrg" <mint regummed> as a reference to a regummed unused stamp. No way is such a stamp to be called "mint," since nothing about its gum is original.

Rpm stamps, your stamp is rotary press type III so if perf 11 on all sides is a #546

Rotary Type III.

You guys are referring to rlm stamp or rgstamp for rotary????

I'm referring to top of thread... Spell check strikes again

Maybe I am not 100% after all... I am tilting towards 546 also on the top stamp.

The original stamp is a type III 546. Aside from being type III and having a wider aspect ratio, the color is a rotary shade. The bottom stamp in the group of 3 is a type Ia Scott 500. It has a partial second line in the right ribbon. Make a direct comparison with a couple of previously identified 528B. The unprinted "donut" inside the toga button outline will be larger and the toga button outline will be strong but the line is not as wide as Scott 500.

Clark