Show Your Show Piece

One of my Buffalo punch cancels on cover. A nicely centered stamp, on a clean, decent cover.


I love this Graf Zeppelin flown piece. It's franked with a 30 cent Columbian. Also of interest is the addressee, Mr. Heinrich Koehler. He started the first, stamp auction house, in Germany. It's still in operation today.
Possibly the only Scott #239 on a Zeppelin cover. I know, it's contrived, but it's mine...

Here's a couple of my "showy" taxpaid revenues. You won't find these listed in Scott!

Really beautiful, Greg!

Here are a couple of show pieces I recently picked up.


210 First Day of Issue - Oct 1, 1883




213P imperfs on stamp paper; vertical and horizontal pairs.




Parts of a special study of this design.

19th century first day covers, I think, are really great. I have none...

Show piece covers, got a few I'm fond of! Humboldt county first.

Bucksport, Cal Dec 8 Humboldt county manuscript postmark
Wells Fargo Ophir Express with matching Free in a double lined oval. It has a Masonic address which may be the reason Wells Fargo and Co. carried the cover free.





A combined Express use, H Fleishman paid Greenhood and Newbauer's Northern Express to deliver this cover to Wells Fargo for their San Francisco mail on Mar 5 1863.





Another Wells Fargo Express out of Humboldt county, from Arcata this time. This cover makes me wonder why Mr Fleishman used Greenhood and Newbauer, unless Wells Fargo & Co didn't have an office in Arcata.





Eel River manuscript on trancontinental 3 cent pse with matching Paid 7. Rather soiled but very early for Eel River (opened Sep 4 1857, name changed to Rohnerville on Jan 24 1874), latest recorded use of manuscript postmark was Apr 23 1863.





Eureka H Bay This is listed as Eureka's second postmark, the first being manuscript, this device was used between Apr 4 1856 and Nov 13 1858.





A matching Wells Fargo Eureka H Bay postmark.

That's very impressive, Phil. Express company mail, especially Wells, Fargo, for some reason usually gets more than a passing glance from me despite my predilection for stamps. You have a nice group here, and you understand it's history. Good job!!

Thank you for the kind words essayk. They mean a lot to me, comming from you, I must be learning!

Cowabunga Uncle Bob! just cruised through these 8 pages and I have to say, there is some BEAUTIFUL stuff out there in SCF land. Well done everyone!

Yeah, its amazing the material you see when you ask collectors to show what they are prowd of.
I'm fond of this early Eureka cover but this postmark (Hum 1640) is recorded used from Aug 27 1860 to Aug 31 1870, never had a penceled in year date. Eureka didn't used a year date in their postmarks until 1888.

I recently decided to start collecting Zeppelin covers. One of my first purchases was the following: Graf Zeppelin Flight LZ 127, Century of Progress Exposition, New York-Friedrichshafen-Pernambuco, franked with U.S. C18, postmarked 10/2/1933 (first day of issue), backstamped 10/17/1933 upon arrival in Brazil.

This was my first "bargain" off of ebay. Seller did not include a premium in his pricing for first day of issue usage of C18 so I got it for a very reasonable price.

I simply had to add a stampless cover to this thread, this one being from Hudson, NY. 1793, the EKU for that PO.

Despite its rather rough appearance, I believe that this is the earlist known cover for the town of Mendocino.





Quite fond of this 1872? cover from Cahato in Mendocino county, with it's early registration payed with what appear to be National Bank note stamps, the beautifull blue grid the stamps are canceled with and Cahato's scarce two ring Oval postmark (Men 320), recorded uses from Jan 4 1872 to Mar 1 1873, a 15 month period. While not as pretty as the first Cahato cover, another piece I like showing is the Aug 1 1872 Cahato foreign mail sent to Belfast, Ireland, again canceling the National BNC stamps with that blue grid and postmarking the cover with another strike of Men 320. The similarities of the postmark stikes ( weak on the left side ) makes me think the postmaster held the device at an angle. Of course, thats sheer speculation.









Here's another piece of foreign bound mail, this one from Caspar Cal to Toscany, Italy.







About twenty miles south of Caspar was Cuffey's Cove, a tiny shipping point, but a pair of beautifull registered covers have survived from this little Post Office.









Speaking of little brings me to my pride and joys, a lovely pair of 1869 covers from Little River, Cal, both addressed to the same young lady, each with a grilled 3 cent stamp and a different postmark, Little River's first and second postmarks.









Two miles north of Little River is the town of Mendocino, origin of many nice pieces in my collection, but one Wells Fargo cover really stands out of the crowd, and although this incoming Wells Fargo cover is soiled, it is an late Out of the Mails usage, and evidence of ship carried mails in Mendocino.









Punta Arenas has provided me with several show pieces, the earlist from Mar of 1865 bearing Puntas Arenas's rare postmark the 28.5 x 19.5mm single line oval, the second with Puntas Arenas's second postmark, and the last with PA's sixth postmark a saw toothed two ring fancy postmark on another Wells Fargo cover.

Really pretty covers everyone. Thanks for showing them.

docgfd, what does the "50" notation at top right of scan signify?

Hi Jenny - The '50' is the rate. Single sheets were charged 12-1/2-cents for mail sent between 100 and 150 miles (postal act of Feb., 1792). Due to enclosures, this one cost 4-times the single rate (50-cents).